Ligue 1 Ivory Coast

Don’t worry, Slovenian fans… it’s just a reference to the yellow jersey’s shorts, which are black for the first time in four years on the Tour (when in tandem with the maillot jaune, that is).

Great stat from our friends at Velon…

Carapaz and a struggling Paret-Peintre make the connection, passing the dropped Engelhardt en route. So we have six clear now with around 25 seconds on the rest of the leading group and almost three minutes now on the second chase group, which appears to have sat up – or, at least, eased up. The peloton is 7’55” down.

Five of the 14 leaders have gone up the road: Jorgenson, Schmid, Johannessen, Garcia Pierna and Engelhardt. They have a small gap, with Paret-Peintre and Carapaz now trying to bridge over.

With the peloton now over eight minutes back, Pinarello Q36.5 and TotalEnergies have send some men to the front to lead the chase. It’s an odd one. They are presumably riding to protect the positions of their respective riders Pidcock and Jegat in the top 10. But Carapaz, the ostensible dangerman, is over 10 minutes behind them in the standings, so is not too much of a threat for now.

Some people would prefer to be on TV than to watch a bike race, it seems - even if it results in them causing a crash. This could have been Opi-Omi all over again...