June 10, 2026
The profile for today's 167 km from Le Puy-en-Velay to Montrond-Les-Bains is very odd for a high profile race like Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. There are six categorized climbs in the first 109 km of racing including the category two climb of the Côte de Chougoirand which is 7.8 km at 5.5% and summits with 89 km remaining. The Col des Limites and two other category four climbs follow before the riders will descend for 15 km into the Loire River Valley for a completely flat final 35 km. The last real corner is 10 km from the finish in Montrond-Les-Bains but the question is whether any of the sprinters will be there to contest the win. This stage is almost impossible to predict which makes it such an intriguing one to follow.
Race Summary
Unfortunately for the sprint teams, a large break forced itself clear at the start and it included some heavy hitters. In the group was Quinn Simmons of Lidl-Trek, Sam Watson of Netcompany-Ineos, Pablo Castrillo and Raúl García Pierna of Movistar, Finn Fisher-Black of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe, Andreas Kron of Uno-Mobility, Lars Craps of Lotto Intermarché, Jordan Jegat and Mattéo Vercher of TotalEnergies, Jan Castellon of Caja Rural-Seguros RGA, and George Bennett and Marco Frigo of NSN Cycling. With 77 km remaining, the break was approaching the summit of the Col des Limites and they had 1 minute 20 seconds on the peloton.
Castellon took maximum mountains points over the top as Cofidis and Alpecin-Premier Tech were pulling hard behind to keep the race within touching distance for a possible sprint with Bryan Coquard and Henri Uhlig. The descent off the Col des Limites looked amazing with sweeping views over the valley and a perfect surface to glide down. The break stayed cohesive up and over both of the category four climbs with Castellon taking the solitary point on each. The gap was more or less steady at 90 seconds but both break and peloton were visibly riding harder.
One more short uncategorized spike brought the leaders to the highest remaining point on the stage at 53 km to go with only downhill off the Livradois & Forez Range and flat roads left to the finish line. Visma-Lease a Bike led down the focused part of the descent but when the roads started to flatten a bit, Bahrain Victorious came forward to chase with the hopes of placing Phil Bauhaus on the top step of the podium at the end of the day. Near the bottom of the downhill, Watson's front tire went flat in the middle of quick right-left turn. He tried to keep it upright but the bike wouldn't turn and the British Champion crashed heavily on his right side. He got back up and finished the stage but looked quite beat up and was out of contention. Moments later, Bennett had an issue with his bike and was forced to retreat to the peloton, leaving 10 riders out front.
The rest of the break reached the bottom of the descent in Trelins at 35 km to go with a gap of exactly 1 minute. Visma-Lease a Bike had the entire team on the front for Wout van Aert and were getting help from Tudor Pro Cycling and Bahrain Victorious. Picnic-PostNL added a man and Alpecin-Premier Tech put two on the front of the peloton but the break formed a double pace line and it was poetry in motion. Their pulls were fluid, no one skipped turns, and with a bit of a tail wind, they were always traveling over 50 km/hr.
With 20 km to go, the gap was down to 40 seconds but most teams in the peloton pulled riders out of the chase and it was only Visma-Lease a Bike and Cofidis doing the work. Over the next 15 km, the gap slowly came down to 20 seconds and the break were well within sight of the peloton on the long straight stretch of road coming into the finish. At 3 km to go, it was still only Cofidis, Visma-Lease a Bike, and Tudor Pro Cycling with other teams such as Bahrain Victorious, Alpecin-Premier Tech, and Picnic-PostNL sitting back and waiting. The gap was down to 15 seconds and it seemed like the peloton could reach out and touch them but the catch still had not been made.
At 2 km, only Visma-Lease a Bike were pulling. Edoardo Affini was making slow progress by closing the gap by just 3 seconds from 3 km to 2 km to go. 400 meters later, Castrillo broke the accord in the lead group by attacking. He was followed by the rest and the Spaniard carried, riding as the lead out man for the quicker García Pierna. Castrillo buried himself and pulled off just inside 400 meters to go. There were no more teammates in the group which forced a long sprint of over 300 meters. One of the first to launch was Simmons. He was matched by García Pierna and Kron at 150 meters but the latter two faded and drifted backwards. Simmons kept charging towards the line but so was Fisher-Black who came out of the slipstream with 75 meters to go. The last 50 meters was a drag race but the American Champion came out on top by half a bike length for the win ahead of Fisher-Black and Vercher who snuck in for third. The peloton sprinted in just 4 seconds later, led by Wout van Aert of Visma-Lease a Bike for 11th on the stage.
There were no material changes to the GC which should stay static tomorrow for what will be the last chance for the fast men to get anything but racing kilometers out of this week.