Wout van Aert wins stage seven as Adam Yates retains lead

LAVAUR, France: Wout van Aert won an explosive stage seven of the Tour de France from Millau to Lavaur as Adam Yates hung on to the yellow jersey amid powerful crosswinds.

Jumbo-Visma’s Van Aert collected his second stage win of the Tour as crosswinds ripped through the peloton in the final hour of racing, with Tadej Pogacar, Mikel Landa, Richie Porte and Richard Carapaz among the overall contenders to lose 80 seconds in the splits.

The 168km stage was raced at a ferocious pace as Peter Sagan’s Bora-Hansgrohe team put the hammer down as soon as they left Millau, dropping the sprinters to enable the former world champion to seize the points leader’s green jersey back from Irishman Sam Bennett.

The Tour continues on Saturday (today) with the 140km run from Cazères-sur-Garonne to Loudenvielle and concludes in Paris on September 20 with the 122km stage from Mantes-la-Jolie to Paris Champs-Élysées.

Yates remained attentive near the front of the peloton throughout the stage and got himself into the front group as the race ripped apart as they left Castres.

Primoz Roglic, three seconds off Yates in second place overall, was in the lead group alongside team-mate Tom Dumoulin, ensuring no change at the very top of the general classification.

Ineos Grenadiers did much of the work to split the group in the winds, with defending Tour champion Egan Bernal well placed, but Carapaz dropped out of the front group after suffering an ill-timed puncture.

Sagan could not figure in the reduced sprint finish but once again took control of the points classification he has won in seven of the past eight Tours, with Bora’s work to split the group allowing him to pick up 17 points in the intermediate sprint won by Matteo Trentin.

Bennett finished a tough day empty handed, part of a group that finished more than 10 minutes down on the road.

That means that Sagan, who began the day trailing Bennett by 12 points in the fight for green, now leads the category by nine.