Le Tour: Majka Stars Amid Skirmishes

Tinkoff-Saxo's Tour de France took a positive turn in the Pyrénées today as Rafal Majka soloed away to win Stage 11 to Cauterets and Peter Sagan regained his lead in the points competition. Majka survived from the day's breakaway over the Col du Tourmalet, dropping all his compatriots including Cannondale-Garmin's Dan Martin, who gamely battled his way into second on the stage, a minute back.

Among the GC contenders, there was more of a truce on the day after three consecutive stages worth of battling, though Vincenzo Nibali once again suffered en route to the line. Bauke Mollema of Trek Factory Racing escaped for a bit of time, and Lotto-Soudal's Tony Gallopin tried to overcome his one-second deficit to Sky's Geraint Thomas, but Sky were alert to the move and pinned him back. Neither the descent of the Tourmalet, 40km out, nor the final climb offered much of a reason to spend precious energy with another massive stage on tap tomorrow.

Nibali had put his Astana team on the front as soon as the Tourmalet got serious, and several pre-race contenders went out the back, including Thiabut Pinot, Jean-Christophe Péraud and Romain Bardet. Up the road, Martin had made a heroic three-minute bridge to what looked like a potential winning break, but the group splintered in the climb and left Majka alone, with their former 7-plus minute lead evaporating. Sky took over the front by the time the race passed through the La Mongie ski station, with Richie Porte again setting a massive pace.

Following the descent of the Tourmalet, Majka maintained a 1.10 lead over Serge Pauwels of MTN-Qhubeka (who ended fourth) and 2.02 over Dan Martin, with the heads of state at six minutes back. Martin rode a ferocious final climb, but it was too short and shallow to recoup more than half his deficit. Emanuel Buchman of Bora-Argon saw Martin slip away, but held on for a strong third on the stage.

Majka swept the mountain points from the last two climbs, launching his defense of the maillot a pois from last year, though he still faces a large deficit to classification leader Chris Froome. Still, today's effort won him his third Tour de France stage (after two last year) and the Souvenir Jacques Goddet, worth EUR5000, awarded to the first rider over the Tourmalet (highest Pyrénéan peak). Sagan took second at the intermediate sprint, gaining a net of ten points over André Greipel, placing him seven points up as the race readies for more mountains.

Results

GC

KOM

Points