Thomas tightens grip on yellow jersey as Roglic takes Queen stage

Roglic winstough final mountain stage and moves up to third on GC behind Thomas and Dumoulin

A brilliant descent on the Aubisque helped Primoz Roglic win stage 19 of this year’s Tour de France. Geraint Thomas won the sprint for second.

A dramatic day of racing it will also be a brute as the peloton took 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 followed the right wheels, Dumoulin, Majka, Roglic while Froome and Martin struggled to keep up on the final climb of the Col d’Aubisque.

Roglic attacked and got a gap, winning the stage and gaining time.

Saturday's 31 km time trial will favour world champion Tom Dumoulin. Roglic is now only 9s behind Dumoulin for the 2nd place, both over 2 minutes behind Thomas who is a good time trialler.

Froome dropped to fourth place and will be looking to get back on the podium, however, Roglic will be looking to overhaul Dumoulin to take 2nd on GC.

The final time trial will decide the final GC before the peloton rolls into Paris for the final sprint.

2018 Tour de France Stage 19 Top 10

1 Primoz Roglic (Slo) LottoNL-Jumbo 5:28:17 
2 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Team Sky 0:00:19 
3 Romain Bardet (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale   
4 Daniel Martin (Irl) UAE Team Emirates   
5 Rafal Majka (Pol) Bora-Hansgrohe   
6 Tom Dumoulin (Ned) Team Sunweb   
7 Mikel Landa (Spa) Movistar Team   
8 Chris Froome (GBr) Team Sky   
9 Steven Kruijswijk (Ned) LottoNL-Jumbo 0:00:31 
10 Ilnur Zakarin (Rus) Katusha-Alpecin

2018 Tour de France GC after Stage 19

1 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Team Sky 79:49:31 
2 Tom Dumoulin (Ned) Team Sunweb 0:02:05 
3 Primoz Roglic (Slo) LottoNL-Jumbo 0:02:24 
4 Chris Froome (GBr) Team Sky 0:02:37 
5 Steven Kruijswijk (Ned) LottoNL-Jumbo 0:04:37 
6 Mikel Landa (Spa) Movistar Team 0:04:40 
7 Romain Bardet (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:05:15 
8 Daniel Martin (Irl) UAE Team Emirates 0:06:39 
9 Nairo Quintana (Col) Movistar Team 0:10:26 
10 Ilnur Zakarin (Rus) Katusha-Alpecin 0:11:49