Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) completed the Grand Tour stage win set after producing a stunning effort from the breakaway to win stage 17 of the Tour de France solo in SuperDévoluy, adding to his three wins from the Giro and three from the Vuelta.
After missing the early breakaway, Carapaz worked tirelessly to get into a chasing 48-rider group in the final 60km of the breathless 177.8km stage alongside the likes of Simon Yates (Jayco AlUla), who was the last rider he dropped on the upper slopes of the Col du Noyer 13.3km from the finish.
Yates rolled across the line 37 seconds behind the winner to take second after a valiant effort to match Carapaz, with Enric Mas (Movistar) rolling over the line in third close to a minute in arrears.
EF Education-EasyPost were finally rewarded for their full gas efforts which have been on display throughout the 2024 Tour, adding a stage win with Carapaz to a magical first stint in the maillot jaune for the Olympic Champion on stage 4.
Despite the peloton letting the breakaway build a near-10-minute gap and fight for the stage win, race leader Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) didn’t give his rivals any recovery time as he attacked towards the top of the Col du Noyer, putting both Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) in trouble.
Evenepoel responded better as he powered past a struggling Vingegaard and began chasing down the yellow jersey on the descent, with satellite riders becoming very important in the final few kilometres. Christophe Laporte first guided Vingegaard down the descent after making it into an early break, which brought the three leaders back together before Evenepoel attacked on the final 3.8km climb.
The Belgian used Jan Hirt to pace for him while Vingegaard has Tiesj Benoot and Wout van Aert to try and protect his second place. Pogačar sat in behind the Visma train before exploding away to snatch two more seconds on his rival as Evenepoel took 12 seconds on Vingegaard in the battle for second.
Pogačar now sits 3:11 ahead of Vingegaard, with Evenepoel 5:09 off the lead and 1:58 from the Dane in second.
More to come…
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