Lars Boom of Belkin , triumphed over the cobbles to take victory in Ardenberg Porte Du Hainaut.
Stage five of the Tour De France, was designed to separate the elite from the contenders in this race and Team Sky had their number one Chris Froome passed fit to start.
It was a brutal 152.5km stage which started in Ypres and took in seven secteurs of cobbles made famous in the Paris-Roubaix race and one which saw riders race into and back out of Belgium, via the Flanders region.
The race started on the N332, 6.4kms from the Market Place start in Ypres with Vincenzo Nibali holding a two second lead over Cannondale's Peter Sagan.
On a day of crashes including Chris Froome and Tony Martin, who was in a lead group along with Westra, Gallopin, Burghardt, Clarke, Haymen, Acevedo and Sam Dumoilin.
Froome went down twice more and he looked in a bad way, not even being able to hold his handlebars and eventually climbed off his bike and into a Sky team car and the champion was out.
The break in the rain had a lead of 2,40 amongst scenes of complete carnage with riders including Andre Greipel and Fabian Cancellera going down.
Points leader Peter Sagan moved into a front group which was a minute ahead of Nibali as Geraint Thomas switched to working for Richie Porte.
Lieuwe Westra took the sprint with Sagan in the mix after coming out of the peloton to snatch what was left before the riders started on the cobbles.
Nibali who was taking turns on the front of his group started to extend his lead over Contador's group.
Sep Vanmarcke and Lars Boom ensured that the early breakers were caught and Nibali was in a group of fifteen riders caked in mud, who had been cheered on by fans who had stood in the pouring rain for more than three hours including myself, to see Nibali's front group speed through the penultimate secteur well ahead of five big groups plus a few stragglers.
Boom and Nibali, keen to put time into his rivals, worked together until there was six kilometres left and Boon decided that he was going off on his own.
It proved the right move as the Belkin rider was able to take an historic stage win in 3.18.35 with Jacob Fuglsang of Astana coming in nineteen seconds down ahead of Vicenzo Nibali who had riden brilliantly to finish third and keep his leader's jersey with Sagan fourth and Cancellera fifth.
Nibali has a two second lead over Fuglsang going into stage six.