Tour de France 2018 – stage 17 LIVE: Geraint Thomas takes major step towards Tour de France crown as Nairo Quintana wins stage 17
Follow all the action from a potentially decisive day of racing in the Pyrenees as Thomas leads the peloton into three gruelling climbs from a gridded start
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Your support makes all the difference.This might just be the day the decides whether Geraint Thomas, Chris Froome or someone else wins this compelling Tour de France.
It is a unique – the purists might say gimmicky – stage 17 which begins with a gridded start of the first 20 riders and immediately embarks on the first of three brutal climbs, finishing with a 16km slog up the steep Col du Portet, making its debut in the Tour de France. It is only 65km, but promises to be an explosive couple of hours.
Thomas remains in pole position to win his first Tour de France, 1min 39sec ahead of his Team Sky team-mate Froome, who is running out of time to make the decisive attack which could bring his fifth yellow jersey. Should they falter or squabble, the Dutchman Tom Dumoulin is only 11 seconds behind Froome and in position to benefit.
Click stage 17 to refresh the live tracker:
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33km to go
Romain Bardet attacks from the peloton! Along with some of his Ag2r team and Dan Martin too, but Team Sky were wise to it and react quickly to shut it down.
31km to go
Durasek, Alaphilippe and Tangert remain around three minutes up the road from the peloton. Can they keep this up? They also have that strong chasing group containing Julian Alejandro Valverde and Adam Yates around a minute back. The pace has really slowed on the Col de Val Louron-Azet, with the hardest of the day's climbs still to come.
26km to go
Movistar is the latest team to take up the gauntlet on the front of the peloton, trying to put some pain into Team Sky legs. Marc Soler is the man driving down the descent towards the day's final climb: the brutish Col du Portet.
20km to go
At the front of the race Durasek can hold on no longer and finally lets go, leaving Alaphilippe and Kangert to go on together. The chasing pack has thinned to only five riders: Valverde, Majka, Poveda, Fraile and Pellizotti. Adam Yates has slipped back to the peloton.
14km to go
Sagan seems to have continued racing, but there is no more information yet on the extent of his injuries, if he has any. He has lost touch with the peloton, however. At the front Julian Alaphilippe has had enough! He indicates to the cameraman his work is done and that leaves the Estonian Tanel Kangert only one monstrous climb from his first Tour de France victory. Only.
13km to go
Primoz Roglic, fourth overall, attacks on the front of the peloton and Chris Froome goes with him! Geraint Thomas can't stay with them and nor can the rest of the yellow-jersey group.
12km to go
Tom Dumoulin leads the chase of Froome, which works in Thomas's favour and he sits on the Dutchman's wheel.
11km to go
Roglic has relented and he and Froome rejoin the yellow-jersey group, which is now just six or seven riders, the domestiques all falling away.
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