to go, Stevens tried to defend his lead by attacking. He was followed by a group of cyclists, including René Pijnen, one of Van Looy's teammates. Pijnen was trying to stop the chase, and this angered the other cyclists in the group. The group nonetheless was able to reduce the margin to less than a minute, and Stevens conserved his lead. In the fifth stage, Stevens was not able to stay in the first group. Désiré Letort, who had joined Stevens in the chase the previous stage, became the new leader, 9 seconds ahead of Merckx. The first mountains showed up in the sixth stage, with a mountain finish on the Ballon d'Alsace. Merckx won convincingly: Joaquim Galera was second after 55 seconds, Altig after almost two minutes, and the next cyclist came after more than four minutes. Because Letort was more than seven minutes behind, Merckx was now the leader, with Altig in second place, more than two minutes behind. Notably, the 1965, 1967 and 1968 Tour de France winners in Felice Gimondi, Roger Pingeon and Jan Janssen were all distanced into the surviving peloton group which finished some two and a half minutes behind Altig. Merckx won the short time trial in stage 8, but only gained two seconds on Altig. Stage 8B was a half stage in which Andrés Gandarias and Michele Dancelli got away from the bunch by almost two minutes setting themselves up for a sprint but Dancelli pulled away near the end and won by four seconds. In the ninth stage, Roger Pingeon and Merckx were away, with Pingeon winning the sprint. Altig lost almost eight minutes, and was out of contention. The second place was now taken by Pingeon, more than five minutes behind. Stage 10 saw the previous year's runner up Herman Van Springel win the stage which included the climbs of the Col du Télégraphe and the Col du Galibier. He finished about two minutes ahead of the Merckx group with the GC only changing slightly. Merckx added some time in the eleventh stage, which he won, and the twelfth stage, where he finished in the first group. After the twelfth stage, Merckx was leading by more than seven minutes. After he won the time trial in stage fifteen, it was more than eight minutes. By then, his victory was all but assured, he just had to make sure that he