Froome joins Sagan to ignite the stage

Words like spontaneous, entertaining and opportunist are often associated with a rider like Peter Sagan, but not so much with the Team Sky leader, Chris Froome. For a long time Froome has been associated with being robotic like, unwilling to ride on instinct, but one who watches his power meter and sticks exclusively to the team plan, often talking with the team car through his radio. Well, not anymore...not after he linked up with Sagan today to rip the race to bits.

The 2016 Tour de France is showing us a new side to Chris Froome...or perhaps one that has always been there but has never had to come out. But with his rivals thinking that they were going to see the same old Chris Froome at this Tour, one who would hide behind his black and blue Sky team mates before exposing himself in the high mountains to make his move on yellow, Froome has changed tact and caught them napping when they least expected him to move.

Firstly with that downhill attack on stage 8 and then today in the cross-winds, on the road to Montpellier, bridging across to a surge by Sagan to form a four man move that included Sagan's team-mate Maciej Bodnar and Froome's team-mate Geraint Thomas. Sagan created the move as you might have expected, but Froome's daring to go with it said a lot about the way he wants to race this Tour. Once again his opponents were caught behind and losing time.

In the end they finished just six seconds ahead of the chasing pack with Sagan taking the win ahead of Froome, but the six seconds bonus acquired by Froome gave him a 12 second gain on the likes of Nairo Quintana who stood pat as he must also have expected Froome to do. The cross-winds were always a risk today so keeping near the front of the peloton should have been the maximum requirement of the general classification contenders, just as being in the front group for the descent last Saturday would have been the expectation.

Yet Froome broke the mold, again.

As a result on two days of surprise moves and riding by initiative to take advantage of rivals not switched on, Froome has put a total of 35 seconds into his opponents (including time bonuses) including Quintana heading to Mont Ventoux tomorrow.

Some will suggest that Froome burned a lot of matches in making that move with Sagan that he might require tomorrow, and that may be true, but if the opportunity presents itself to gain time, surely you should take it and worry about tomorrow, tomorrow. Quintana will hope that when he attacks on Ventoux, that Froome won't have the little extra in his legs and that the Colombian can pull back the lost time. But the fact is, Quintana is already having to attack to recover time never mind build an advantage.

The alternative theory is that Quintana burned almost as many matches today as Froome in the chase to pull back the yellow and green jersey's. They did only gain six seconds after all and the peloton were moving at a similar speed and whereas Froome only had to worry about a four-up time-trial, Quintana had to work to stay near the front of the peloton in those cross-winds, work to avoid the bumping and grinding that goes with it, and handle the stress of the chase. As a result Froome may have put in a hard surge to bridge to Sagan, but beyond that the benefits are all his.

I suppose we shall see tomorrow, but tonight the overall standings now look as follows:

1. Chris Froome (Sky) in 52h34'37"

2. Adam Yates (Orica BikeExchange) @ 28"

3. Daniel Martin (Etixx - Quick Step) @ 31"

4. Nairo Quintana (Movistar) @ 35"

5. Bauke Mollema (Trek-Segafredo) @ 56"

6. Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) same time