Home favourite solos to victory

Home favourite Pierre Rolland produced a superb solo ride to win the 11th stage of the Tour de France.

The Frenchman, who won the young riders classification in last year's race, moved away from the peloton as part of the early breakaway group and proved to be the strongest rider on the day as he passed the finish line almost a minute ahead of the rest of the field to go into the top 10 on the general classification. Britain's Bradley Wiggins managed to extend his overall lead in the race with a gutsy performance on the final climb of the day while Team Sky colleague Chris Froome moved up to second in the standings. However, the story of the day was perhaps the decline of last year's champion, Cadel Evans, who began to suffer after making an early attack and eventually lost over a minute and a half to Wiggins and has now slipped to fourth in the overall race.