Details are sketchy at the moment but Team Astana have confirmed that Levi Leipheimer, who was involved in a fairly innocuous looking stack in the last 2km of yesterday’s stage to Vittel, has suffered a broken wrist and won’t be able to start today’s stage.

Leipheimer was lying fourth behind Nocentini, Contador and Armstrong and it’s a big blow for Team Astana to have one of their major players retire before such an important stage.

The only details we have thus far are from Astana and Leipheimer’s Twitter feeds. "Team doc has confirmed that Levi has a transverse fracture of the right scaphoid (in wrist). Will not be able to start.", says the team’s feed, and Leipheimer himself simply states, "My wrist is broken. I can’t describe how disapointed I am"

Leipheimer’s retirement sees Bradley Wiggins move up to fourth place in the Tour ahead of today’s testing stage to Colmar.

Levi’s broken arm and sad expression (pic from TwitPic)