Tour de France: Christophe Laporte breaks sprinter's ambitions with late-attack win on stage 19

Jumbo-Visma have continued their run of victories at the Tour de France, with Christophe Laporte winning stage 19 after a late attack and a perfectly planned out tactic to take a dominant triumph.

A group of five riders went up the road early on, Nils Politt (BORA - hansgrohe), Mikkel Honoré (Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl Team), Taco van der Hoorn (Intermarché - Wanty - Gobert Matériaux), Quinn Simmons (Trek - Segafredo) and Matej Mohoric (Bahrain - Victorious).

The race was neutralized once again due to a protest on the road, but the group of five moved swiftly through the fields of southern France. They were never given much liberty however, with the gap always below two minutes as the sprinter teams knew the weather conditions would favour escapees. One by one the riders in the break began to loose contact, with Simmons the last survivor being caught with 35 kilometers to go.

Right afterwards Tadej Pogacar was active in the moves, however a trio went up the road with Alexis Gougeard, Jasper Stuyven and Fred Wright. They quickly built a 30 second gap, but Alpecin-Deceuninck and TotalEnergies brought the pace up once again.

With a constantly high pace the group eventually struggled to keep the lead. Christophe Laporte jumped across to the trio inside the final kilometer, with Fred Wright launching an attack that kept the gap alive into the final 500 meters. The Frenchman took advantage of the situation however, making a move in the uphill finale with 500 meters to go and going solo off the front.

Carrying massive firepower, the Jumbo-Visma riders rode to the finish alone, winning for the second time this season. Jasper Philipsen sprinted to second place with Alberto Dainese third.