Del Toro conquers Grand Colombier as crash dents Seixas' Dauphiné challenge

Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) conquered the Grand Colombier to win stage 7 of the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes after a dramatic day of racing that saw Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) lose ground after suffering a heavy crash in the first hour.

Del Toro launched his winning move with 4.2km remaining, and he would catch and pass his former teammate Juan Ayuso inside the final 2km to claim the stage win and put himself firmly in contention to claim overall victory on Sunday.

The Mexican won the stage by 24 seconds from Ayuso, who had set out alone with a little under 7km to go. Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) took third on the stage at 38 seconds, just ahead of Matteo Jorgenson, while Seixas came in at 1:21.

Luke Tuckwell (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) remains in the yellow jersey ahead of the final stage, but he conceded 2:33 here, and Del Toro will feel he is within striking distance of overall victory thanks to his display on the mighty Grand Colombier.

In the overall standings, Tuckwell carries a lead of 42 seconds over Jorgenson into the final stage, with Del Toro third at 49 seconds and Ayuso fourth at 1:06. Seixas rose a place to sixth overall, but he is 1:54 off yellow and over a minute behind both Jorgenson and the dangerman Del Toro.

There were some 13 non-starters for the penultimate stage of the Dauphiné, including Oscar Onley (Netcompany-Ineos), who had crashed into a ravine the previous afternoon, and João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), who had been well short of his best all week.

The early trio of climbs saw a flurry of early attacks, but warnings of gravel on the descent of the third, the Côte de Saint-Maurice-de-Rotherens, saw the race briefly neutralised before it resumed at the 30km mark.

Shortly afterwards, Seixas crashed heavily, and the day took on a very different dynamic. It took some time for the Frenchman to remount, and by the time he resumed, he was almost four minutes down.

It initially looked as though his Dauphiné challenge was doomed, but Decathlon CMA CGM managed their resources smartly, dropping Stefan Bissegger, Daan Hoole, Aurélien Paret-Peintre and Nicolas Prodhomme back one by one to help Seixas’ pursuit.

By the top of the category 1 Lacets du Grand Colombier, Seixas had closed to within two minutes of the yellow jersey group, despite the ongoing attacking out in front and the pace-making of UAE Team Emirates-XRG in the peloton.

A break featuring Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek), Laurens De Plus, Carlos Rodriguez (Netcompany Ineos), Valentin Paret-Peintre (Soudal Quick-Step), George Bennett (NSN) and Clément Berthet (Groupama-FDJ United) held a lead of 45 seconds as they entered the final 40km, but the real drama was behind, as Seixas caught up to his GC rivals on the approach to the penultimate climb, the category 2 Col de Richemond.

Juan Ayuso’s Lidl-Trek team set the tempo on the climb, and by the summit, they had closed to within 30 seconds of the surviving members of the break, Paret-Peintre, De Plus, Bennett and Berthet.

The break would be swept up with 13km to go, setting the scene for a grand finale on the Grand Colombier.

The climb was barely 500m old when Tuckwell and Seixas were among those slightly distanced by the pace-making of Lidl-Trek, with the yellow jersey and the pre-race favourite seemingly eager to avoid over-extending themselves on the lower portion of the wickedly steep climb.

With a shade under 7km to go, Ayuso went on the offensive. Only Ben Tulett (Visma) tried to follow, but he quickly dropped back to help his teammate Matteo Jorgenson, who formed a chasing group with Isaac del Toro, Cian Uijtdebroeks and Tobias Halland Johannessen.

With 5km to go, the Jorgenson group trailed Ayuso by 24 seconds, while Seixas was battling to limit his losses at 37 seconds. The key move came with 4.2km to go, however, when Del Toro attacked from the Jorgenson group and set out in lone pursuit of his former teammate. He caught him with 1.7km to go and pressed on alone for victory.