FROOME IN FULL CONTROL
▶ Briton stretches Tour lead as former ski-jumper Roglic wins surprise stage
Former champion ski-jumper Primoz Roglic took a sensational solo victory on the mountainous 183-kilometre Stage 17 of the Tour de France yesterday.
Chris Froome came third to stretch his overall lead to 27 seconds as Rigoberto Uran moved up to second and Fabio Aru dropped to fourth, with Romain Bardet remaining third.
Slovenia’s Roglic, 27, was junior world ski-jumping champion in 2007 but switched to cycling in 2012.
“To win a stage, I’ve dreamt about it many times,” said Roglic, whose girlfriend and family were at the finish of the Tour’s “Queen stage” that started in La Mure. “Right now I cannot really form all these feelings. Later, probably, I will know how big it is.”
Roglic was part of an initial 33-man breakaway that was whittled down to just six when he attacked 6.4km from the summit of the Col du Galibier, which at more than 2,600 metres above sea level was the highest point of this year’s Tour.
He crested the climb, 28km from the finish in Serre-Chevalier, with a lead of just over a minute-and-a-half on a group of chasers that included the top contenders.
On the descent a five-man chase group developed, including Froome.
Uran took second, 1min 13sec behind Roglic, to snatch six bonus seconds that moved him up to second, on the same time as Bardet.
Froome took four bonus seconds for finishing third to help increase his lead and said he was congratulated by French President Emmanuel Macron at the finish.
“It’s a great honour to be congratulated by the president. It’s also a very good thing for the Tour and the sport that he came here,” said Froome, 32.
“My legs are better than in the Pyrenees. Today I felt good. I think also for tomorrow, we have the finish on the Col d’Izoard which will be very, very difficult.”
Today’s second straight Alpine stage features a brutal finish at the summit of the imposing Col d’Izoard.