Stage 14

The road

At the start

Cathar country, and a breakaway day

Mark Cavendish won again in Carcassonne, a 34th Tour stage that draws him level with Eddy Merckx — a record set in 1975, equalled by a rider who did not have a contract eight months ago. Simon Yates and Lucas Hamilton both climbed off yesterday. Today wanders through the Cathar foothills to Quillan over five modest climbs: made for a strong break.

How it was won

1. 195 km to go

   The break finally forms

   After ninety kilometres of relentless attacking the decisive move goes on the Col de Montségur — Poels, Cattaneo, Woods, then Chaves, Martin, Higuita, Konrad and more. Mollema is a latecomer, and drags himself across by the summit.

2. 274 km to go

   Four Frenchmen bridge

   Rolland and Pacher attack together, Gesbert and Madouas join them, and the quartet crosses the two-minute gap on the plateau to make it fourteen at the front.

3. 358 km to go

   The polka-dot duel

   Poels beats Woods to the summit points but the single point Woods takes moves him past Quintana into the virtual mountains lead. Moments later Woods slides out on a left-hander in the gorge below and has to chase for kilometres.

4. 440 km to go

   Mollema rips clear

   Just over forty kilometres from Quillan, on a descent, Bauke Mollema goes all-in with one enormous acceleration and opens a gap immediately. Thirteen riders behind him cooperate properly and still cannot bring him back — the same trick, on the same kind of day, that won him a Tour stage in 2017.

5. 517 km to go

   Over the Saint-Louis

   Head bobbing, the Dutchman climbs strongly onto the last summit of the day with just under a minute in hand as Cattaneo's pressure splits what is left of the chase to four.

6. 6At the line

   Quillan

   Forty kilometres alone and Mollema still has time to sit up, the second Tour stage win of his career and the peloton nowhere in sight.

The result