Stage 9 today: shortened by the heat, but not a flat metre in it

Thirty kilometres scrapped

The heatwave that has been battering the peloton since week one has now reached the route itself. The area around the start is under a red weather alert today, so the organisers cut the opening section of the stage: 155.5 kilometres instead of 185.5, with the start in Malemort pushed back to 1:35 pm. The finale in Ussel is expected around a quarter to six — in roughly 34 degrees, a couple of degrees cooler than at the start. One small detail with big consequences: all four categorised climbs survive the cut.

The Suc au May as judge

There is nothing flat about today: some 3,000 metres of climbing lie in wait, and the finish in Ussel sits over 400 metres higher than the start. The key rendezvous is the Suc au May in the Monédières hills: 3.8 kilometres at 7.7 per cent, exactly steep enough to tear the break apart. Then come the Côte de la Croix du Pey (4.8 km at 6%) and, 24 kilometres from the line, the short but nasty Mont Bessou — 900 metres at 7.3 per cent, up on the roof of the Corrèze. Whoever is at the front there can start dreaming.

Who wins? Watch the break

Too hard for the sprinters, too soft for a GC battle: this is comfortably the best breakaway opportunity of the first week. And one name jumps out. Mads Pedersen recced this stage with Lidl-Trek and already won in exactly this fashion in Foix — get in the move, survive the climbs, finish it off. With the intermediate sprint barely twenty kilometres in, he has an extra reason to jump too.

Behind him the list is long. Mathieu van der Poel rarely gets a Tour stage that suits him better, though he is still searching for his best legs this year. Ben Healy, Romain Grégoire, Magnus Cort, Dorian Godon and Quinn Simmons all live for days like today, and with Tom Pidcock and Jonas Abrahamsen you never know where they'll pop up. Expect a long fight to make the break — and in this heat, only the ones who pace it wisely will survive.

And the favourites? Counting down to the rest day

Among the big names we expect a ceasefire today. The terrain is too soft to tempt Tadej Pogačar and too hard for one team to control, so the break will almost certainly get its space. Some vigilance is still required: on a day like this a dangerous climber like Tiesj Benoot or Matteo Jorgenson can easily slip up the road, and after the Tourmalet Visma knows every second counts.

Then: rest. Monday is the first rest day, and on Tuesday — quatorze juillet, Bastille Day — it all kicks off again with the stage to the ski resort of Le Lioran. France, a national holiday and a hilly stage: we know how that recipe goes.