stage 12

although it looked like a fairly standard stage on paper, the weather played a major part and split the field dramatically. the biggest winner of the day was bettini who jumped clear for the win on a difficult finish. the biggest loser of the day was valverde who freaked out on the descent and lost over 3 min to the leaders so effectively is out of the running. when the astana and euskaltel teams saw him drop back they smashed him on the 50km run into town.

on the tipping front, no real changes to the order, but a few people picked up some extra time. the biggest winner was team creditless onthedole who tipped well enough to pick up a swag of mountain points and jumped clearly into the lead.

rest day tomorrow before heading back to the hills.

stage 12

so the sprinters got to play today and cavendish pulls out his third stage win of the tour. are we looking at the same again tomorrow as we have another flat stage, or will everyone be tired and want to let the break go.

two teams tipped cavendish, but as the group all came in together, no-one really lost any time.

team baumbaum is still atop the overall standings and chris' team 01 has a commanding lead in the green jersey comp. the mountains jersey is on hold for another few days until we head into the alps.

so you can either play it safe and go for a sprinter, or dig deep into the lucky dip and try to pick which french rider will go for 4hrs of television coverage off the front of the main pack.