World road champion Philippe Gilbert finished fifth for the BMC Racing Team in the Tour de France 3rd stage Monday while teammate Cadel Evans moved into ninth overall on the eve of the team time trial.

Evans said the 145.5km stage was more conservative than he had anticipated.

"I honestly expected a more aggressive race from the start," the 2011 Tour de France champion said. "I thought more would be interested in getting in the breakaway on such a hard stage and the breakaway has a pretty good chance if it's a good quality one. But they sort of let a group go quite easily."

Ultimately, the five escapees were brought back and Evans finished 13th as Simon Gerrans (Orica-GreenEdge) pipped Peter Sagan (Cannondale Pro Cycling) for the stage win. Jan Bakelants (RadioShack Leopard) kept the race lead.

By virtue of its second place on the team classification, the BMC Racing Team will be the second-to-last team to start the 2 km race against the clock in Nice. "We can look forward with confidence at the team time trial tomorrow," BMC Racing Team Directeur Sportif John Lelangue explained. "We have worked on this since the beginning of the year. We had three days on a wonderful course with a team who is in good shape and worked well to protect Cadel. Now we will see what happens at the team time trial and, after this, we go to the Pyrenees."