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As it happenedended1532706579

Tour de France 2018 - stage 19 LIVE: Geraint Thomas extends lead as Primoz Roglic overtakes Chris Froome with victory

Follow all the action as the peloton take on the final day in the moutains

Lawrence Ostlere
Col du Tourmalet
Friday 27 July 2018 15:45 BST
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Tour de France stage 18 summary

The 2018 Tour de France is reaching its climax and the final day of mountain racing promises to be a thriller.

While it is set to be a dramatic day of racing it will also be a brute as the peloton take on three of the four climbs considered part of the Pyrénean 'circle of death': the Col d’Aspin and Col d’Aubisque sit either side of the highest pass in the French Pyrénées and one of the great Tour de France climbs, the Col du Tourmalet.

Race leader Geraint Thomas has three stages between him and the greatest win of his career. Saturday's time trial will favour world champion Tom Dumoulin but today won't be without problems either as he faces attacks from all sides. Team Sky will hope to shut it down and create a snoozefest, of course, but there is enough there for it to produce fireworks – if enough riders are prepared to gamble.

We will have all the latest throughout the day.

Click stage 19 to refresh the live tracker:

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97km to go

The Tourmalet has strung this race out again with a couple of counter groups between the yellow-jersey group and the front of the race. Nine riders lead the way: Adam Yates and Mikel Nieve (Mitchelton-Scott), Julian Alaphilippe and Bob Jungels (Quick Step), Tanel Kangert (Astana), Warren Barguil (Fortuneo-Samsic), Gorka Izagirre (Bahrain-Merida) and Andrey Amador (Movistar), and they are still 5km from the summit. The three closest chasers are Bardet, Zakarin and Landa, two minutes back, with the yellow jersey a further 30 seconds behind. No attacks aimed at Thomas yet with Team Sky taking control on the front.

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 14:09
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90km to go

There are now six riders cresting the Tourmalet summit: Julian Alaphilippe, Bob Jungels, Gorka Izagirre, Warren Barguil, Mikel Nieve and Tanel Kangert. Team Sky continue to control the gap, around 2 min 50 sec back. With Mikel Landa in between and chasing a podium, Team Sky might be able to coax Sunweb and Lotto NL-Jumbo to fight to protect the podium spots of Dumoulin and Roglic respectively. Interesting.

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 14:29
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80km to go

Julian Alaphilippe is flying down the descent from the Tourmalet in his element, and he leads the race on his own right now.

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 14:39
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The state of play in emoji form:

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 14:44
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70km to go

Mikel Landa is an interesting proposition in this race. He is slowly bridging the gap to the leaders, with the help of his team-mate Amador, and this has the potential to send him shooting up the general classification and into podium contention, as the rest of the big hitters continue to plug away behind Team Sky in the yellow-jersey group three minutes back. Still a long way to go, of couse.

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 14:50
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52km to go

Landa has joined up with the leading group and now leads the race, as they let him and Romain Bardet do the work. 

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 15:15
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47km to go

Mikel Landa and Romain Bardet attack, ditching the rest of the leading group who are not putting in much of shift, while Alaphilippe decides his work is done and slips back towards the peloton.

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 15:24
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42km to go

Robert Gesink has just single-handedly changed this stage. The Lotto NL-Jumbo rider decided he wasn't going to let Landa and Bardet close the gap on Primoz Roglic's hopes of finishing on the podium and hammered his way up the start of the Col des Bordères, the penultimate climb of the day, slashing the leaders' advantage by more than a minute. Disheartened, Landa and Bardet have given up their attack and rejoined the rest of the breakaway.

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 15:38
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Latest on Peter Sagan:

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 15:43
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39km to go

The nine riders leading this race, by around 1 min 40 sec from Team Sky and the peoton: Warren Barguil (Fortuneo-Samsic), Gorka Izagirre (Bahrain-Merida), Mikel Nieve (Mitchelton-Scott), Bob Jungels (Quick-Step), Tanel Kangert (Astana), Mikel Landa (Movistar) and Rafal Majka (Bohra Hansgrohe), Ilnur Zakarin (Katusha-Alpecin) and Romain Bardet (AG2R). 

Lawrence Ostlere27 July 2018 15:45

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