Adam Yates moved in to the overall lead at the Criterium du Dauphine following Wednesday’s tricky 26.1km time-trial.
Chris Froome was blown into a wall by a gust of wind and suffered at open fracture of the femur.
Team Ineos said Froome would miss the Tour de France due to his injuries with the 34-year-old helicoptered to hospital after lengthy treatment at the scene.
The stage itself was won by Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) in 33min 38sec, ahead of Tejay Van Garderen (EF Education First) at 31s with Tom Dumoulin (Team Sunweb) in third at 47s.
“It’s a first WorldTour race win. I can’t believe it,” said Van Aert, who is ninth in the overall standings at 30sec.
“I didn’t know it was possible to win on this level so I’m super happy,” added the 24-year-old former cyclo-cross world champion.
Yates actually finished sixth on the day to claim the yellow jersey in a race where he came second last year.
“That was a good time and a good day for me,” said Yates, who will race the Tour de France. “We have one sprint stage tomorrow, so hopefully the sprint teams will help us control, and then it’s straight to the mountains,” he said of the eight day route that finishes with two major days of climbing this weekend.
“We’re in the jersey now and hopefully we can hold it all the way to the end.”
Yates leads overnight leader Dylan Teuns by just four seconds, Van Garderen is third at 6sec while Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) is just 7sec back.
Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) in sixth at 25s and Nairo Quintana (Movistar) in 10th at 40s, stand out as potential eventual winners too.
Thursday’s fifth stage is a 201km ride through flat planes.
Critérium du Dauphiné 2019 – stage 4 results (Roanne – Roanne ITT):
| 1 | Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) | 33:38 |
| 2 | Tejay Van Garderen (EF Education First) | +31” |
| 3 | Tom Dumoulin (Team Sunweb) | +47” |
| 4 | Steven Kruijswijk (Jumbo-Visma) | +49” |
| 5 | Emanuel Buchmann (Bora-hansgrohe) | +51” |
| 6 | Adam Yates (Mitchelton-Scott) | +56” |
| 7 | Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-Quick-Step) | +59” |
| 8 | Nils Politt (Katusha-Alpecin) | +01’05” |
| 9 | Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) | +01’07” |
| 10 | Rémi Cavagna (Deceuninck-Quick-Step) | +01’10” |
Critérium du Dauphiné 2019 – general classification after stage 4:
| 1 | Adam Yates (Mitchelton-Scott) | 12:27:26 |
| 2 | Dylan Teuns (Bahrain-Merida) | +04” |
| 3 | Tejay Van Garderen (EF Education First) | +06” |
| 4 | Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) | +07” |
| 5 | Steven Kruijswijk (Jumbo-Visma) | +24” |
| 6 | Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) | +25” |
| 7 | Emanuel Buchmann (Bora-hansgrohe) | +26” |
| 8 | Alexey Lutsenko (Astana) | +30” |
| 9 | Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) | ,, |
| 10 | Nairo Quintana (Movistar) | +40” |
