Heartbreak for Cavendish as Jasper Philipsen does it again on stage 7 of the Tour de France

In the third bunch sprint of the 2023 Tour de France it was Jasper Philipsen who took the win, edging out Mark Cavendish in a thrilling finale.

Stage 7 of the Tour de France sees the riders leave the Pyrenees and start heading north. The metropolitan area of Bordeaux receives the Tour de France back, for a stage that will be perfectly suited to the fast men. The first true transition day as the riders steer away from the mountains.

Although four riders initially went clear and formed a breakaway, three of them were soon told to sit up, leaving poor Simon Guglielmi of Team Arkéa Samsic all on his lonesome up front.

At the intermediate sprint, Guglielmi took maximum points. Behind him though, it was Biniam Girmay who proved strongest as the time-gap between the lone leader and the peloton dropped to just 40 seconds.

Following the intermediate sprint, Nans Peters and Pierre Latour decided to attack from the peloton and give Guglielmi some company.

With around 40km to go though, Guglielmi began to feel the effects of having spent so long out in the wind. Having lost the wheel of his two compatriots, he was caught by the peloton.

With 10km to go the leading duo maintained an advantage of 28 seconds over the bunch and with 5km to go that gap was just 6 seconds.

All the GC riders were safely through the 3.6km mark as it had been extended to for today's stage as the break was caught.

Then, it was all about the sprint. Van der Poel lead out Jasper Philipsen once again but as Mark Cavendish came around, history was in his sights. Philipsen turned heartbreaker though with a brilliant finish.