After four days of the Tour du Rwanda, Chris Froome was a quiet presence in the peloton.

But all that changed on stage 5, a hilly 195-km ride from Rusizi to Rubabu with six major climbs. Lucisi, a four-time Tour de France winner who started his season in Australia last month, made the break of the day midway through the stage.

But no other riders joined him, and with 115km to the finish, it was a lonely day in the rain for the 37-year-old.

Froom's last professional victory came at the 2018 Giro d'Italia, where he made a stunning comeback by riding solo 80km to Bardonecchia. This time, he would spend a similar amount of time on the attack, even if the end result was not exactly the same.

Soon Froome had opened up a gap of more than three minutes on the peloton and was the de facto race leader. Two hours later, however, bad luck struck and Froome's adventure came to an end. He was forced to change wheels twice on the final climb and fell back into the peloton with 40 km to go.

Things got even worse when Froome dropped out of the lead group and crashed with a few kilometers to go.

"It was a rough day. This was a rough day. I saw the whole peloton stopped about halfway through, so I decided to hang in there and test my legs."

"The goal was to see if I could make it over the last climb on my own and down to the finish. It wasn't that far. I think I had a 30-40 second lead on the Euskaltel rider behind me (counter-attacker Mikel Ituria) and about a minute and a half on the peloton.

"I got a flat front wheel, but the team car had already pulled out and there was no team car behind me. I managed to get another wheel from a neutral service, but it didn't fit the bike, so I had to stop again and exchange it with the team car. Then the peloton caught up with me and surged at the top of the climb, where my lights went out."

Froom's day got worse from there, as he hit the deck while dodging cars on the road.

"I was chasing a couple guys downhill, and as I rounded a corner, a Quick Step car stopped and their rider crashed.

"I turned the corner at the limit and the car was running into the road, so I gave up and went down into the ditch. So I scratched it up a little bit, but thankfully there doesn't seem to be any damage."

The glory of this stage ultimately went to Callum Ormiston (Global 6 Cycling).

Early in the race, Froome said, "I'm happy to be here in Rwanda and to debut in an eight-day competition."

"I'm going to keep fighting every day," he said. Just being here, racing and pushing is good for the next race and preparation

. I am not going to win this Tour of Rwanda because I am not in a race-winning shape yet. My big goal is the Tour de France in July, so now I will start preparing for July."

In addition to preparing for future races with the team's development riders Roi Weinberg, Nadav Reisberg, and Cole Kessler, Froome and the Israeli Premier Tech Team are also working with the country's "Field of Dreams" bike center (new Open in tab) in the country to open a "Field of Dreams" bike center (open in new tab).

The project grew out of a campaign to raise funds to build a center, pump track, and 1.2 km race track in Bugesera, with a special edition kit provided at last year's Tour de France.

"Seeing the joy on the kids' faces during the ride was like a huge victory," Froome said at the inauguration ceremony last week. It's a game-changing project."

The center, the first of its kind in the region, was broken-in by the Israeli Premier Tech team, which raced with a local women's cycling team that has been supported by the WorldTour team for the past two years.

In the future, the facility will be used by the Rwanda Cycling Federation, which will also host coaching, training, and racing sessions for children from Bugusela and surrounding areas.