Thibaut Pinot wins stage seven of Tour de Suisse as Sergio Higuita jumps into race lead

Thibaut Pinot had given all the signals, and on the final day in the mountains the Groupama - FDJ climber rode to a stage win in Malbun after proving to be the strongest out of the breakaway.

With the peloton reduced to 84 riders at the start, it was no surprise to see a large breakaway go up the road early on as the peloton lacked the firepower to control the day. A group of 20 riders went up the road including several of the pre-stage favourites such as Alexey Lutsenko, Thibaut Pinot, Ion Izagirre, Ilan van Wilder, Fausto Masnada and Clément Champoussin. Mathieu Burgaudeau also made his presence felt in front, having for large kilometers the provisional lead of the race.

The breakaway saw it's riders save themselves for the final ascent to Malbun, whilst in the peloton Israel - Premier Tech managed the gap and brought it back into the control of Fuglsang. The decisions were to be made already inside Liechenstein, with Ion Izagirre attacking in the base of the climb and going solo in front. Slowly but surely Thibaut Pinot reeled the Spaniard in, and went off in the final two very steep kilometers.

In the peloton Bora showed intention of accelerating the pace, however it was Daniel Martínez once again pacing the group up most of the mountain. However differences were made today as Sergio Higuita made a move in approximately the same spot and distanced both Jakob Fuglsang and Geraint Thomas.

Thibaut Pinot took the stage win, finishing in front of Oscar Rodríguez and Alexey Lutsenko. Sergio Higuita finished afterwards, taking 11 seconds on Geraint Thomas and 29 on Jakob Fuglsang.