Stage 4

The road

At the start

The longest stage, and Cavendish equals Hinault

Mark Cavendish won again in Angers, by a hair from André Greipel, and takes the green jersey back — his twenty-eighth Tour stage, level with Bernard Hinault. Peter Sagan keeps yellow, Alaphilippe at eight seconds, Valverde at ten, Froome and Quintana at fourteen. Today is the longest stage of the race, 232 kilometres to Limoges, where no day-long solo break has succeeded at the Tour since the year 2000.

How it was won

1. 17 km to go

   Naesen and Irizar swallowed

   After 230 kilometres, the longest stage of the race, the last two escapees are caught with seven to run and the sprint trains take over a run-in cluttered with roundabouts and traffic islands.

2. 2At the line

   Kittel by millimetres

   Lotto hit the front too soon, Kittel jumps off Greipel's wheel inside 200 metres, and Coquard emerges from nowhere in sight of the line. The commissaires need the photo for the second day running — Kittel's first Tour stage since 2014, and he wipes away a tear.

The result