Stage 5

The road

At the start

Gerrans in yellow, Sky at three seconds

Orica-GreenEdge won the team time trial by three quarters of a second and now hold the whole podium: Simon Gerrans in yellow from Impey and Albasini, all on the same time. Chris Froome and Richie Porte sit seventh and eighth at three seconds. Today the Tour heads west for two hundred and twenty-six hot kilometres to Marseille, rolling, with four small climbs and no obvious reason not to end in a sprint.

How it was won

1. 140 km to go

   Five minutes, and forty to go

   The six went early and were given thirteen minutes, and the peloton has left the arithmetic far too late. With forty kilometres to Marseille the gap is still over five minutes, and Omega Pharma-QuickStep have to come to the front and start hurting.

2. 220 km to go

   The Côte des Bastides thins it out

   A long, shallow fourth-category drag twenty kilometres from home, and it does more damage than its category suggests. Arashiro attacks off the front of the escape; behind, a crash in the middle of the bunch takes down Kittel and Vande Velde, and the German's sprint is over before it starts.

3. 34 km to go

   Lutsenko is taken with four to go

   Lutsenko has one last go with Reza when the gap drops under a minute, and it buys him nine kilometres. The Astana rider is caught four kilometres from the line — the last man standing from a break that has been out for over two hundred.

4. 4At the line

   Cavendish out of the wreckage

   Lotto have it lined up for Greipel and Sagan has taken his wheel when, at two hundred metres, a crash goes down across the road and blocks everyone behind it. A handful of riders are left, and Mark Cavendish — riding through bronchitis — has the fastest legs among them for the twenty-fourth time at this race.

The result