The 152.5-kilometer race from Santa Clarita to Mountain High summit rearranged the overall classification behind the top two places. Bradley Wiggins (Team Sky) eked out a couple more seconds over Rohan Dennis (Garmin-Sharp) as they continued to hold the top two spots, but there was a complete restructuring in the next positions as the long, hot - and mostly uphill stage - zapped legs.

Matthew Busche finished in 22nd place and dropped from the top 10 overall. It was not his best day in the saddle; a disappointing performance that could have been a result of numerous factors, he explained:

“The profile was mostly uphill the entire day – at least it felt that way! The start was really hard; not just the pace and effort but the heat was really making it difficult. Even after the breakaway went, the heat was oppressive. It made you ‘blah’ – you did not want to eat. The guys did a good job again in taking care of me. By the time we got to the last climb I was feeling okay – I think I had taken care to drink and eat enough – but with 3k to go I just did not have anything left in the tank. Basically I just got ridden out the back. It could have been the accumulation of heat over the last days, and just hard racing for six days in a row; it was a long day, long climb, altitude – could be any number of reasons, who knows? It’s disappointing. But I guess you can’t win them all.”

Six men molded the principal breakaway, and continued to animate the final kilometers to the summit finish. It was a day where the strongest legs won, and Colombian Johan Esteban Chaves  (Orica-GreenEdge) rode to a merited win.

Behind the battle for GC raged as Garmin-Sharp threw riders out front hoping to disrupt Team Sky and Bradley Wiggins. But Sky simply set a fast tempo to the top, swept up all who could not withstand their pace, and provided Sir Bradley enough service to keep him safely in yellow by the finish line.

Trek Factory Racing’s plan going into the race was to be part of the day’s significant breakaway. However, the start of the day was not easy: plenty of tired legs from successive days of punitive heat and hard racing, coupled with the wide-open and relentless, up-and down road made it difficult to make the selection.

“It was chaos pretty much from the start. Groups were going, and it looked like the break had gone with Markel [Irizar] in there, but the roads are so big and wide here that there’s always a chance for a rider to go and start it all over again. And that’s what happened. It looked like they were gone, but it started again. The peloton kept splitting - there were probably three or four groups on the road. It was up and down and really hard. I suppose that’s why the group that did go was very strong and why they ended up staying away.  It was a tough day,” said Jesse Sergent.