Luc Leblanc of France moved past Greg LeMond into the overall lead of the Tour de France today in the first hard mountain stage of the race.
Leblanc finished third for the day behind another Frenchman, Charly Mottet. However the leaders were about seven minutes ahead of the main group which included LeMond, who had a 4-minute, 20-second advantage over Leblanc at the start of the day.Leblanc moved from sixth to first while LeMond dropped to second more than two minutes behind.
Two rough climbs, both ending above 4,900 feet sea level, marked the 119-mile leg from Pau to Jaca, Spain.
The 12th stage began the second half of the cycling marathon after a transfer day to get to the base of the Pyrenees.Earlier in the day, a protest by the riders delayed the start 36 minutes.
The riders had protested the disqualification of Urs Zimmermann, a Swiss riding for the American team Motorola.
Zimmermann was disqualified Wednesday for failing to travel to Pau on the plane provided by race organizers. His team's director, Jim Ochowicz, was suspended for a day.
"Zimmermann made an appeal of the decision of exclusion against him in the course of the group demonstration of the riders," Jean-Marie Leblanc, the head of the Tour de France, said. "The direction of the tour has accepted to review his case."
Zimmerman was allowed to re-enter the race but was not classified.
The riders are also protesting the mandatory wearing of helmets. Temperatures during the day rose to about 95 degrees.
Friday's stage is the probably the hardest of this year's race. It has four difficult climbs as the Tour heads back to France to Val Louron.