Tour de France

Thor Hushovd grabs Tour De France win but day belongs to David Millar

• David Millar's brave breakaway comes to nothing
• Hushovd wins sixth stage for Cervélo in their debut season
David Millar
US cycling team Garmin-Slipstream's David Millar rides into the lead before being engulfed by the peleton late on in the sixth stage of the Tour de France won by Thor Hushovd. Photograph: Patrick Hertzog/AFP/Getty Images

If you were a person of considerable means and wanted to establish a hideaway in a quiet corner of old Europe, you could do much worse than choose Girona, a historic city of 90,000 people tucked away in the north-eastern corner of Catalunya, about 40 miles from the French border. And if you were to decide on Girona, you might very well make your home in the Çarrer de la Forca, a narrow cobbled street halfway up the hill between the river Ter and the medieval Gothic cathedral. That's what Lance Armstrong did, soon after starting his run of seven Tour de France wins.

Today's sixth stage of the Tour, the first in the race's history to start and end in Spain, set off from Girona, which is now the base of several English-speaking riders.

Armstrong was welcomed back to the city where an architect friend created a luxurious four-bedroom family apartment for the rider and his family, its handsome wooden front door opening on to the shaded Plaça de Correu Vell. He stayed for several years, and his children were christened in the cathedral, but he left after announcing his retirement in 2005.

"It still feels like home," he said on the eve of what turned out to be a day spent trundling along in the peloton, seldom far from either Fabian Cancellara, the overall leader, or Alberto Contador, with whom he is engaged in a barely concealed battle for the leadership of the Astana team.

By the time they reached Barcelona, at the end of a 181.5km ride along the coast, their positions in the general classification were unchanged. Thor Hushovd won yesterday's bunch sprint, giving the Cervélo squad a maiden win in their debut season.

Formed by a Canadian company who make the world's most coveted racing bikes, the team are also distinguished by the stylish black and white design of their riders' jerseys – a rarity in modern cycling, with most teams desperate to cover their uniforms with as many sponsors' logos as possible.

After finishing fourth behind Mark Cavendish in Brignoles on Sunday and second to the English rider the following day at La Grande Motte, the 31-year-old Norwegian powered up the hill to Barcelona's Olympic stadium ahead of a squadron of rival sprinters, with Cavendish a few metres back in 15th place, after a day spent in unaccustomed obscurity.

The day otherwise belonged to a current resident of Girona. The 32-year-old Scottish rider David Millar made a break with two Frenchmen, Sylvain Chavanel and Stéphane Augé, after 50 minutes, opening up a three-minute lead as they wound around the wooded hills of the Costa Brava. By the time they were joined by the Basque rider Amets Tzurruka, their lead was down to about 90 seconds and rain had started to fall, but they went over the corkscrew third-category climbs of Sant Vincenc de Montalt and Collsacreu together, Augé picking up the points that enabled him to take the king of the mountains jersey.

It was with 30km to go that Millar divested him of his companions, who faded back into a peloton now thundering along only a minute behind the lone Garmin-Slipstream rider. The lead came down as he raced through the rain-slicked streets of Barcelona's north-eastern suburbs, and two multi-rider crashes, one of them involving Tom Boonen, were too far back in the bunch to hinder the assault.

"Stupidity," a smiling Millar replied when asked what had prompted the break. "I rode with the heart rather than the head. I hadn't planned it at all. I've done that coast road so many times in training that I thought, 'I can have fun here,' and before I knew it I was off and away on my own."

He turned into the avenue leading to the palace of Montjuic still a handful of seconds ahead but was engulfed as he laboured up the final incline. "I was enjoying holding off the peloton for so long," he said, "and with 10km to go I thought I had it. But then when I saw those huge boulevards, I knew they had the advantage.

"If there had been a few more corners it might have been different, but they had the space to organise and get going. When you turn round and see them coming up that quick, it's like someone's unplugged your power. You go from being fired by adrenalin to the power going and you die, immediately."

His consolation was the daily prize for showing combativity, and will ride today's stage with a red background to the race number pinned to his jersey. Meanwhile Cavendish will wear the green jersey for a fifth consecutive day, encouraged by Hushovd's remark that he was not counting on the 24-year-old Manxman relinquishing it through failing to complete the mountain stages.

"I don't think he'll give up," the stage winner said. "He's changed as a rider since last year. He goes very well in the climbs now. You could see that today."

But Cavendish will be gritting his teeth tomorrow morning as the riders set off into the Pyrenees for a marathon 224km stage that ends with an hors-catégorie climb to a 2,240m summit in Andorra. All eyes are now on Contador, the 2007 Tour de France champion and one of the pre-race favourites this year, who will be expected to attack in an effort to reassert his leadership in front of a predominantly Spanish crowd on the slopes of Arcalis.

Provisional result: 1, Thor Hushovd (Norway/Cervelo) 4hr 21min 33sec; 2, Oscar Freire (Spain/Rabobank) same time; 3, Jose Joaquin Rojas (Spain/Caisse d'Epargne); 4, Gerald Ciolek (Germany/Milram); 5, Franco Pellizotti (Italy/Liquigas); 6, Filippo Pozzato (Italy/Katusha); 7, Alessandro Ballan (Italy/Lampre); 8, Rinaldo Nocentini (Italy/AG2R); 9, Cadel Evans (Australia/Silence - Lotto); 10, Fabian Cancellara (Switzerland/Saxo Bank)

Overall standings: 1, Cancellara 19hr 29min 22sec; 2, Lance Armstrong (US/Astana) same time; 3, Alberto Contador (Spain/Astana) +19sec; 4, Andreas Kloeden (Germany/Astana) +23s; 5, Levi Leipheimer (US/Astana) +31s; 6, Bradley Wiggins (GB/Garmin) +38s; 7, Tony Martin (Germany/Columbia) +52s; 8, Christian van de Velde (US/Garmin) +1m 16s; 9, Gustav Larsson (Sweden/Saxo Bank) +1:22s.

Sprinter standings: 1, Mark Cavendish (GB/Columbia) 106 points; 2, Hushovd 105; 3, Ciolek 66; 4, Tyler Farrar (US/Garmin) 54; 5, Cancellara 53; 6, Rojas 53; 7, Freire 47; 8, Thomas Voeckler (France/Bbox - Bouygues) 41; 9, Romain Feillu (France/Agritubel) 39; 10, Samuel Dumoulin (France/Cofidis) 36.

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