These are the profiles for the individual stages in the 2007 Tour de France, with Stage 11 on 19 July, and Stage 20 on 29 July.

Stage 11 2007-07-19 — Marseille – Montpellier, 182.5 km This was the first of two transition stages between the Alps and the Pyrenees, with no climbs.

Robbie Hunter took the stage when he powered for the line and held off Fabian Cancellara after a number of sprinters crashed in the final kilometre on a tight corner.

French favourite Christophe Moreau finished more than three minutes after the leaders. He was caught napping when Astana hit the front shortly after going through the feed zone in Arles. Despite the best efforts of his AG2R team Moreau could not bridge the gap, which increased steadily as the leaders set a relentless pace. On a day in which no movement was expected at the top of the General Classification, Moreau, who crashed early in the stage, slipped from sixth to 14th after coming in three minutes 20 seconds back.

Michael Rasmussen kept clear of danger on the 182.5 km flat route from Marseille to Montpellier to maintain his hold on the yellow jersey. And it looked as if Tom Boonen would tighten his grip on the green jersey with Erik Zabel off the pace, but the Belgian lost momentum on the fringes of the crash in the final kilometre and eventually came home 37th. New Zealander Julian Dean hit the deck along with Iker Camaño, Sebastien Hinault, Marcel Sieberg and Fränk Schleck.

Stage 11 result RankRiderTeamTime 1 3h 47' 50" 2 s.t. 3 s.t. 4 s.t. 5 s.t. 6 s.t. 7 s.t. 8 s.t. 9 s.t. 10 s.t.General classification after stage 11 RankRiderTeamTime 1 53h 11' 45" 2 + 2' 35" 3 + 2' 39" 4 + 2' 41" 5 + 3' 08" 6 + 3' 39" 7 + 3' 50" 8+ 3' 53" 9 + 5' 06" 10 + 5' 20"

Stage 12 2007-07-20 — Montpellier – Castres, 178.5 km This was another transition stage heading west to Castres, with a category 2 climb just 40 km from the finish. The terrain was expected to offer some opportunities for the attackers but ending in a sprint at the finish line.

The first attack of the day to get away happened at about the 52 km mark when Amets Txurruka and Pierrick Fédrigo broke away from the peloton. A couple of chases, including a solo effort by Marcus Burghardt, briefly got away but were soon reeled in by the peloton.

Shortly after the descent from the category 2 climb near the finish, the pace set by Française des Jeux and Lampre–Fondital at the front of the peloton, in an effort to catch Txurruka and Fédrigo, became so blisteringly fast that some riders willingly dropped off the back of the peloton, knowing that by dropping off so close to the finish line they would not risk being disqualified.

Txurruka and Fédrigo proved much more difficult to catch than first thought; as the peloton neared them within 10 km to the finish line, it was calculated that the catch would occur between 2 and 3 km to the line. The two valiantly fought on and wound up being caught just as the peloton reached the 1 km to go mark, leading to a classic bunched sprint at the finish, where the top three men in the points classification standings were the first three to the line.

Stage 12 result RankRiderTeamTime 1 4h 25' 32" 2 s.t. 3 s.t. 4 s.t. 5 s.t. 6 s.t. 7 s.t. 8 s.t. 9 s.t. 10 s.t.General classification after stage 12 RankRiderTeamTime 1 57h 37' 10" 2 + 2' 35" 3 + 2' 39" 4 + 2' 41" 5 + 3' 08" 6 + 3' 39" 7 + 3' 50" 8+ 3' 53" 9 + 5' 06" 10 + 5' 20"

Stage 13 2007-07-21 — Albi, 54 km (ITT) This was the first individual time trial since the prologue and was relatively flat with a twisty downhill finish.

An early downpour of rain saturated the road and made for dangerous conditions for many of the early riders. Reigning world time trial champion (and winner of the Prologue time trial) Fabian Cancellara had extreme difficulty negotiating a right-hand turn around the 30 km mark and lost most of his speed, before eventually crashing and losing a great deal of time. Others also fell at this turn.

Cofidis' Bradley Wiggins rode through the rain to set the first time to beat, that stood for most of the day. Alexander Vinokourov lead at every time check and shattered Wiggins' final time by more than two minutes. It is likely, however, that his performance was aided by drugs.

General classification leader Michael Rasmussen was expected to lose a great deal of time, having had one of the worst time trials ever for a top-flight professional in the 2005 Tour de France. He finished 11th originally, much better than expected, and was upgraded to 10th when Vinokourov was disqualified, though his own premature exit from the Tour days later casts doubt on this performance.

The rain let up by the time there were about 40 riders left to leave the starthouse, though the course still remained more treacherous than it would have been had the day been completely dry.

Vinokourov originally won the stage in 1h 06'34", but on April 30, 2008, he was officially stripped of the victory due to his subsequent positive test for blood doping.www.cyclingnews.com - the world centre of cycling

Stage 13 result RankRiderTeamTimeDSQ 1h 06' 34" 1 1h 07' 48" 2 + 25" 3 + 30" 4 + 1' 00" 5 + 1' 02" 6 + 1' 04" 7 + 1' 24"DSQ+ 1' 25" 8 + 1' 28" 9 + 1' 41"General classification after stage 13 RankRiderTeamTime 1 58h 46' 39" 2 + 1' 00" 3 + 2' 31" 4 + 2' 34" 5+ 3' 37" 6 + 4' 23" 7 + 4' 45" 8 + 5' 07" 9 + 5' 10" 10 + 5' 29"

Stage 14 2007-07-22 — Mazamet – Plateau-de-Beille, 197 km

The race headed into the Pyrenees. This stage started with a category 2 climb out of Mazamet and then followed a relatively calm route via Carcassonne, Limoux and Quillan before taking on the Port de Pailhères (17 km at 7.2%) and a very difficult finish at Plateau-de-Beille (16 km at 7.9%).

A six-man breakaway formed out of a group that at first numbered 27. That 27-man group featured race leader Michael Rasmussen and his King of the Mountains rival Mauricio Soler. The six who went forward attained a maximum advantage before the Saunier Duval and Rabobank squads set to reeling them in. Their pace proved fast enough that the autobus formed almost immediately as the peloton started the ascent up the Port de Pailhères.

More splits occurred on the later climbs in the course, with the yellow jersey group, paced by Rasmussen's teammates, numbering some 45 riders for most of the stage.

Rasmussen attacked on the ascent to the Plateau-de-Beille, and only Alberto Contador could stay with him. They caught every member of the leading break. Soler had earlier taken the lead in the King of the Mountains, but Rasmussen retook it at the Plateau-de-Beille, though Contador outsprinted Rasmussen to the finish line.

Stage 14 result RankRiderTeamTime 1 5h 25' 48" 2 s.t. 3 + 37"DSQ+ 40" 4 + 53" 5 + 1' 52" 6 + 1' 52" 7 + 2' 23" 8 + 2' 23" 9 + 3' 06"General classification after stage 14 RankRiderTeamTime 1 64h 12' 15" 2 + 2' 23" 3 + 3' 04" 4+ 4' 29" 5 + 4' 38" 6 + 5' 50" 7 + 6' 58" 8 + 8' 25" 9 + 9' 45" 10 + 10' 55"

Stage 15 2007-07-23 — Foix – Loudenvielle, 196 km

This was thought to be one of the major stages of the Tour, with no fewer than five major mountain passes – including the Col de Port, the Col de Portet d'Aspet (5.7 km climb at 6.9%), the Col de Menté (7.0 km climb at 8.1%), the Port de Balès (19.5 km at 6.2%), (the first time this climb was featured in the Tour), and finally the Col de Peyresourde (9.7 km climb at 7.8%) with a downhill finish in Loudenvielle.

An early 2-man break was joined by a 23-man chase group to form a leading group of 25 that represented 17 teams. Notables in this group included Alexander Vinokourov, the original stage winner, Kim Kirchen, was upgraded to the stage victory upon Vinokourov's disqualification, and Haimar Zubeldia, whose second place on the stage vaulted him into the top ten in the General Classification, as well as George Hincapie, Denis Menchov, and Bernhard Kohl.

Many splits occurred on the way up the Col de Peyresourde, with Vinokourov taking a quick 30 second lead over his breakaway mates, holding on to that advantage to be the original stage winner. Michael Rasmussen and Alberto Contador traded attack after attack from the group they had been in, catching most of the early break, finishing in the top ten of the stage, and gaining time over other contenders such as Cadel Evans, Levi Leipheimer, Andreas Klöden, and Carlos Sastre, who were left in the remnants of the group they had left.

Vinokourov originally won the stage in 5h 34'28", but on April 30, 2008, he was formally stripped of the victory due to his positive test for blood doping the next day.

Stage 15 result RankRiderTeamTimeDSQ 5h 34' 28" 1 5h 35' 19" 2 s.t. 3 + 7" 4 + 1' 23" 5 + 2' 32" 6 + 3' 34" 7 + 3' 34" 8 + 4' 25" 9 + 4' 40" 10 + 4' 40"General classification after stage 15 RankRiderTeamTime 1 69h 52' 14" 2 + 2' 23" 3 + 4' 00" 4+ 5' 25" 5 + 5' 34" 6 + 6' 46" 7 + 7' 27" 8 + 7' 54" 9 + 8' 24" 10 + 9' 21"

Rest day 2 2007-07-24 News of a failed blood doping test by Astana rider Alexander Vinokourov after Stage 15 filtered through late on Monday evening. On Tuesday, the rest day, Marc Biver announced that the entire Astana squad remaining in the Tour would be withdrawn. Two of their riders, Andreas Klöden (5th) and Andrey Kashechkin (8th), were in the top 10. This altered the general classification standings.

Corrected General classification after stage 15 RankRiderTeamTime 1 69h 52' 14" 2 + 2' 23" 3 + 4' 00" 4+ 5' 25" 5 + 6' 46" 6 + 7' 27" 7 + 8' 24" 8 + 9' 21" 9 + 10' 41" 10 + 12' 29"

Stage 16 2007-07-25 — Orthez – Gourette–Col d'Aubisque, 218.5 km

After a rest day, the riders took in the Tour's hardest stage, and the last chance for the climbers to make the time gains they’d need before the final time trial. The race was thought to split up somewhat on the brutal Port de Larrau (14.7 km climb at 8.1%), despite the fact that its summit came just 79 km into the stage. The race dipped into Spain for some 50 kilometres at the summit, the fourth country visited in this year's Tour. From there, there was little reprieve for the riders, hitting the Alto Laza and the Col de la Pierre St Martin (14.2 km climb at 5.2%) before descending to the start of the difficult, and very steep, first-category Col de Marie-Blanque (9.3 km climb at 7.4%). The riders then climbed the infamous Col d'Aubisque (16.7 km climb at 7%), which rewarded out-and-out climbing ability and punish the legs of all the major contenders.

The Basque separatist group ETA carried out at least 1 explosion along the route near the town of Belagua. However the riders had already gone past that point and no one was hurt.Blast sOn Tour De France Route |Sky News|House Ads

An early attack by Stéphane Augé, one-time holder of the polka-dot jersey during this Tour, was answered by José Vicente García, Gorka Verdugo and Christophe Rinero. As Verdugo, 67th and more than 90 minutes behind Michael Rasmussen, was the best-placed man in this break the peloton was more than happy to let them go. Barloworld set to pacing the peloton after the escape, with Rabobank staying close behind them.

Mauricio Soler came free from the peloton before the first climb of the day and took full points available to him, taking the lead outright in the King of the Mountains from Rasmussen. He and Carlos Sastre, for whom it was something of a surprise that he was able to get away from the peloton easily as he was 5th in the GC at the beginning of the day, worked together to stay away as long as possible. They wound up being caught with 11 kilometers left to race by a group containing Rasmussen, Alberto Contador, Levi Leipheimer, and numerous domestiques from their teams. Rasmussen came clear of this group on the way up the Aubisque to win the stage. It was thought at the time that this all but cinched his victory in the Tour, since only flat stages and an individual time trial remained, and that even a relatively weak time trialist like Rasmussen was unlikely to lose three to five minutes.

Stage 16 result