Tour de France 2026: stage 19 from Gap to Alpe d’Huez – live
7m ago 12.30 BST Tour de France worries emerge for Pogacar after illness sweeps through team Richard Carapaz won stage 18 of the Tour de
7m ago 12.30 BST Tour de France worries emerge for Pogacar after illness sweeps through team Richard Carapaz won stage 18 of the Tour de France after a breakaway group of six riders duelled their way to the winter sports station at Orcières-Merlette, but uncertainty surrounds the health of race leader Tadej Pogacar’s UAE Team Emirates XRG, which has been swept by a virus since Monday’s rest day. After Adam Yates’s stage-long calvary on the road to Voiron, Pogacar’s team was further weakened by the abandonment of his American colleague, Brandon McNulty, who quit the Tour with 21km of Thursday’s stage remaining. Two more of Pogacar’s teammates, Tim Wellens and Florian Vermeersch, also appeared to struggle at times during the stage, which included five categorised climbs, including the final seven-kilometre ascent to the finish.
Speaking at the stage start in Voiron, Wellens suggested other riders within the team were unwell and revealed that he had a sore throat. Seen through the lens of Friday and Saturday’s mountain-top finishes on Alpe d’Huez, Pogacar, despite his 4m 32s lead over second-placed Remco Evenepoel, has reason to be worried. “I’m sad that Brandon could not finish. We will see in the next two days but Adam is getting better, and tomorrow, we will go with the flow,” Pogacar said. “I think we can manage. It’s the third week, all the teams are suffering. There are bodies everywhere on a stage like today. We will keep fighting and I believe we can do it.” Read Jeremy Whittle’s full report from stage 18: Tour de France worries emerge for Tadej Pogacar after illness sweeps through team Read more Share 18m ago 12.20 BST Here’s the official visualisation of what the riders are taking on today: Allow Instagram content?
This article includes content provided by Instagram. We ask for your permission before anything is loaded, as they may be using cookies and other technologies. To view this content, click 'Allow and continue'. Allow and continue Share 27m ago 12.11 BST William Fotheringham's stage guide William Fotheringham Stage 19, Friday 24 July: Gap to l’Alpe d’Huez, 127.9km This Tour’s most prestigious mountain stage finish; with a stage this short, it will be touch and go for the day’s escape to make it to the finish. That said, the opening 25km over the Cols Bayard and du Noyer are tough enough to allow a decent move to get established and then there are 60km until the Col d’Ornon, where Pogacar and Vingegaard will probably get their teams moving.
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