Tadej Pogacar's dreams of winning a third Tour de France are over after a crushing day's action that saw the UAE Team Emirates rider crack in spectacular fashion.
Defending champion Jonas Vingegaard extended his overall lead by finishing fourth, while Austria's Felix Gall won the gruelling Stage 17 – billed as the “Queen” stage with 69 kilometres of Alpine climbing – with Simon Yates second and Pello Bilbao third.
The Dane – who started the day one minute and 48 seconds ahead of Pogacar after a blistering time-trial on Tuesday – is now seven minutes and 35 seconds clear of his rival with three stages to go before Sunday's processional stage to Paris.
Vingegaard hardly needed to attack as the Slovenian hit the wall and lost contact with 14.5km remaining in the stage.
With around 7km left of the final climb up the Col de la Loze, Pogacar told his team radio: “I'm dead … I can't go on.” By the finish line, Pogacar had ceded 5 min 45 sec to the maillot jaune.
Pogacar's teammate Adam Yates is up to third at 10 min 45 sec, while Ineos rider Carlos Rodriguez slipped to fourth. He is 1 min 16 sec behind Adam Yates and 18 sec ahead of twin Simon Yates of Jayco Alula.
“I'm relieved to have more than seven minutes but we're not in Paris yet, there's some tricky stages left, still,” said Vingegaard.
Gall, making his Tour debut, delivered a first win of this year’s race for the AG2R Citroen team, having unexpectedly taken over the leadership role within the squad after Ben O’Connor’s overall ambitions faded in the first week.
“I don’t know what to say,” the 25-year-old said. “This whole year has been incredible and now to do so well in the Tour and to win the 'Queen' stage it’s incredible. I just want to say thank you to the team, they have given me so much.
“It’s not easy to do a three-week stage race and then to also have the role of leader after a few days, I slowly focused on that and I was stressing myself about that, it’s not easy but the last few days I’ve been more comfortable. I was afraid I would be caught in the last kilometre but it’s incredible.”
Bad luck could have struck in the Col de la Loze, when a race motorbike stalled amid massive crowds, forcing an organisers' car to come to a halt and another race motorbike to go on the side of the road.
Vingegaard slowed down and zigzagged through to continue his demolition work until the line, which he crossed with a big smile on his face.
“We were blocked by motorbikes, they were almost falling on us,” France's Thibaut Pinot, 12th overall, said.
“Some motorbikes probably stalled. Also why do they let cars pass us when the gap between the groups of riders is just 15 seconds?”
