FTDF Stage 7 - Stage Goes Badly for Bradley

Nobody likes to see a crash in the Tour, (well maybe the sort of person that enjoys those "Cycling's nastiest crashes" type videos). Anway, when someone in your Fantasy Tour team goes down, you really share the rider's pain. So it was with damp eyes that I watched Bradley Wiggins clutching his shoulder at the side of the road. He quit the race with a broken collar bone.

It's a real shame, Wiggins looked to be in great shape, and up till today, had kept out of trouble. Now we'll never know how well he would've done in the mountains against the big GC contenders. Let's hope he gets well soon, and maybe he can do something at the Veulta later in the year. Not a good day for Sky then. They were riding high after that stage win yesterday, but now they'll have to hunt for stage wins. Maybe Geraint Thomas will cheer up and score me some more points.

Wiggins wasn't the only casualty of the day. Tom Boonen abandoned early on in the stage, as he was still suffering the effects of his crash back on stage 5. Also out was Rémi Pauriol, who went down in the same crash as Wiggins. Another man down, was Chris Horner of Radioshat, he managed to finish the stage, but judging by this video he may not be in any shape to continue the race - if he even knows he's in a race.



With all the drama, it was easy to forget that Mark Cavendish became the first man to win more that one stage of the race this year. It was his 17th Tour stage win, and the finish was in the town of Chateauroux, where he won his first stage back in 2008. He he was today

And here he is back in 2008.

So to the scores! And the Bile Beans are still out in front. But the going gets tough in the next few days and I've just lost one of my GC hopes.

With the stage to Super-Besse tomorrow, we should expect the big-boys to start showing their stuff. Thor Hushovd is more than likely to lose the race lead up the tough final climb. The next man in line to take yellow, will be Cadel Evans. As the cliché goes, we won't see the race won tomorrow, but we might see it lost.