Tour de France: Quintana wins stage 18

Nairo Quintana (Movistar) claimed victory on stage 18 of the Tour de France after he soloed clear of the day's early break on the Col du Galibier, but not for the first time on this race, the day's drama centred on Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-QuickStep), who retained his yellow jersey following a breathless descent into Valloire.

Alaphilippe was distanced by his direct rivals near the summit of the Galibier, but he scrambled down the other side to recoup his 20-second deficit and keep a hold of the maillot jaune. Just two days from Paris, Alaphilippe remains on course for a most improbable overall victory, though Egan Bernal (Ineos) reaffirmed his credentials on the first of three consecutive Alpine stages by gaining more than half a minute on the yellow jersey to move up to second place overall.

Bernal accelerated forcefully a little over three kilometres from the summit of the Galibier and quickly established a sizeable advantage over the yellow jersey group. At this rarefied altitude, the Colombian looked rather more at ease than most and when his lead yawned out towards 45 seconds, it appeared as though he might be placing a down payment on final overall victory.

Bernal's gains might even have been greater had his teammate Geraint Thomas not launched an acceleration of his own closer to the top that had the collateral effect of slicing his initial advantage to half a minute or so. When Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ) took over the reins in the yellow jersey group in the final kilometre, his forcing proved too much for Alaphilippe, who was shaken loose on the last ramps before the summit.

It briefly looked as though Alaphilippe's unexpected adventure in yellow might be coming to an abrupt halt, but the Frenchman was unfazed, throwing himself wholeheartedly into the descent. He caught Pinot, Thomas, Steven Kruijswijk (Jumbo-Visma), Emanuel Buchmann (Bora-Hansgrohe), Mikel Landa (Movistar) and Rigoberto Uran (EF Education First) with 8km remaining and even defiantly tried to distance them on the last hairpin bends before the road flattened out in the finale.

"I took a lot of risks on the descent. I think it was impossible to go faster but I absolutely wanted to save my jersey," Alaphilippe said afterwards.

Up ahead, Quintana had long since sealed stage victory, 1:35 ahead of a battling Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) and 2:28 up on Alexey Lutsenko (Astana), while the lone Bernal was gamely picking his way through the remnants of the early break as he looked to maintain his advantage over his podium rivals.

Bernal came home 8th on the stage, 4:46 down on his fellow countryman Quintana, but 32 seconds ahead of the yellow jersey group. That performance was enough to lift him to second place overall, 1:30 down on Alaphilippe, with Thomas a further 5 seconds down in third. Kruisjijk and Pinot drop to 4th and 5th overall, respectively, still 1:47 and 1:50 behind Alaphilippe, while Buchmann remains in 6th place at 2:14.

"I felt good and I'm happy that, in the end, we've gained time on Julian Alaphilippe. That was our number one goal," Bernal said afterwards. "G [Geraint Thomas] told me to attack and make that jump and he said that then he'd try. We're a team and everything we do is because the directeur sportif in the car tells us to do it."

In the Pyrenees, all the momentum had looked to be with Pinot, but the Frenchman acknowledged that he had suffered on the first instalment of the Alpine tripleheader. "I wasn't on a good day," Pinot said. "I tried to follow the best. I didn't manage to go with Egan Bernal who was very strong. Geraint Thomas did a big attack too, but I was able to get back on at the top of the Galibier. Now we've got two summit finishes where more things should happen and where above all I hope I have better sensations."

Bernal and Thomas' accelerations on the upper reaches of the Galibier that put Alaphilippe into difficulty will give Ineos optimism that they can finally unseat the Frenchman on the summit finishes to come. Alaphilippe, for his part, will be buoyed by the fact that Thursday's stage was the longer and more demanding than the two Alpine days ahead. This most unpredictable of Tours remains as delicately balanced as it ever was.

"I gave everything and I'm still in yellow, so I can be satisfied. I didn't feel too bad until the attacks from Bernal and Thomas. That's what changed things, but I hung in there," Alaphilippe said. "I lost a bit of time to Bernal but it could have been a lot worse."

How it unfolded

The furore surrounding the exclusion of Tony Martin and Luke Rowe dominated conversation at the start in Embrun, but the polemic was soon put to one side following a rapid start to proceedings once the flag dropped, with a wide variety of riders eager to infiltrate the day's early break – some with dreams of stage honours, others with obligations to their team leaders, and plenty more just trying to get a head start on the time cut.

The front of the race was still in its nip and tuck phase when Alexey Lutsenko (Astana) led over the category 3 Côte des Demoiselles Coiffées but a sizeable break eventually forged clear ahead of the day's first major obstacle, the 2,109m-high Col de Vars. Nairo Quintana (Movistar) was the highest placed of their number on general classification, with 33 other riders aboard the move, including Dylan Van Baarle (Ineos), Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale), Damiano Caruso (Bahrain-Merida), Michael Woods (EF Education First), Adam Yates, (Mitchelton-Scott) and Greg Van Avermaet (CCC).

That group already had five minutes in hand over the peloton on the lower slopes of the Vars, and they extended that advantage to some 7:30 by the summit, where Tim Wellens (Lotto Soudal) outsprinted Bardet to the king of the mountains points.

Over the other side, Van Avermaet and Julien Bernard (Trek-Segafredo) slipped away from the break and this duo would face into the hors categorie Col d'Izoard with a buffer of more than a minute on their erstwhile companions. Back in the yellow jersey group, meanwhile, George Bennett (Jumbo-Visma) endured a scare when he crashed on the descent but he swiftly remounted and rejoined his teammate Kruijswijk's side. The unfortunate New Zealander would crash again on the descent of the Galibier, but has declared himself fit to line out again on Friday morning.

The fearsome Izoard saw both races within a race ignite. Up front, Bernard shed Van Avermaet and reached the haunting Casse Desert alone, but as the gradient stiffened, Quintana, Adam Yates and Romain Bardet began to force the issue in the fragmenting chasing group. They made contact with Bernard within sight of the summit, and Caruso led over the top. Down the other side, Caruso, Bardet and Bernard were joined by Yates, Quintana, Michael Woods (EF Education First), Alexey Lutsenko (Astana) and Lennard Kämna (Sunweb), now with a lead of 5 minutes over the yellow jersey group.

By then, the group of favourites had been whittled down considerably after Marc Soler hit the front on the Izoard on behalf of Mikel Landa. The Catalan's stint of sustained pace-setting saw Julian Alaphilippe shorn of all his teammates bar Enric Mas, while Ineos lost Michal Kwiatkowski and Gianni Moscon, and Thibaut Pinot lost his key lieutenant David Gaudu. Although the French youngster got back on before the Galibier, he was unable to perform his by-now habitual cameo on behalf of his leader.

Movistar had appeared to be teeing up Landa for an acceleration, but the anticipated onslaught never came. Instead, the Spanish squad relented in the valley ahead of the Galibier, as if suddenly remembering that Quintana was bounding up the overall rankings thanks to the break's hefty lead over the yellow jersey group. By day's end, Quintana had moved up to 7th at 3:54, while Landa is a minute further back in 8th.

Ineos took up the reins on the long, two-part final ascent, which brought the race up the Col du Lautaret before turning onto the Galibier itself, with Jonathan Castroviejo setting the tempo before Van Baarle dropped back from the break to take over. Their combined efforts whittled the yellow jersey group down to a dozen or so riders, but made little inroads into the break's advantage.

Quintana found himself with Adam Yates, Romain Bardet, Damiano Caruso, Alexey Lutsenko and Michael Woods for company after the Lauteret had whittled down the front group significantly before the Galibier proper. After Lutsenko kicked with 26km to go, Quintana responded with a stinging acceleration of his own. With 7km of climbing to go, Quintana opened a decisive gap.

After a subdued Tour, he was, for a day at least, something like himself again. By the summit, he was 1:43 clear of Bardet, and he retained most of that buffer on the 19km drop into Valloire to put a different slant on a trying race. Bardet had the consolation of moving into the polka dot jersey as he, too, bids to salvage something from a disappointing Tour.

"This stage was one for the pure climbers, for the real climbers in the bunch, and I was present. I was ready for it. It's a beautiful win, and on a stage like this, with this type of profile, it makes me emotional," Quintana said.

Since his debut in 2013, Quintana has laboured in the hope of becoming the first Colombian winner of the Tour. That honour might yet fall to his fellow countryman Bernal, who produced his best display of the race to date on the mighty Galibier, but for Ineos – and others – Alaphilippe is still proving a strikingly tough out.

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