Geraint Thomas (UAE Team Emirates) was unable to keep up with Tadej Pogachar (UAE Team Emirates) and Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) on the final climb to the altiport finish on the Col de Val Lelong Azé and Peyragude I was unable to.

Thomas was 2:07 ahead of Pogachar, who outpaced Vingegaard in the 13% finish, but the Ineos Grenadiers rider was over a minute ahead of his GC rival. [However, Nairo Quintana (Arkea Samsic) was 7:53 behind Vingegaard. However, Nairo Quintana (Alcare Samsic) was 7 minutes 53 seconds behind Vinge goal.

Thomas survived Thursday's final mountain stage in the Pyrenees and will be able to further reduce his time in Saturday's 40.7km final time trial.

"I felt good, but the pedals didn't feel as light as they did earlier in the race. I wasn't in perfect shape today," Thomas said after a long drink, realizing that he still had to climb more than a kilometer to the Ineos Grenadiers team bus parked above the finish area.

"I was there but decided to wait for the group behind me. I didn't want to go into the red and risk blowing up here and losing even more time. I saved my legs a little bit and was able to run a solid pace all the way to the line."

Thomas suffered on the final climb of Val Lelong Azé after Mikkel Bjarg set a hell of a pace for Pogachar, tearing the GC group to shreds. Brandon McNulty then took over and the group was reduced to just himself, Pogachar, Vingegaard, and Thomas.

Thomas was able to stay with them until 2.5 km from the summit of the Col de Val Lelong Azé.

"I wasn't expecting Bjarg in particular. I wasn't expecting Bjarg in particular," Thomas said.

"It was crazy to see him hurt me so much on the climb. Pogachar won. Pogachar won because they took it on.

Thomas seems to have accepted third place overall and a podium in Paris, but he continues to race hard and is wary of Thursday's final mountain finish in Autacam.

"It's difficult now," he admitted, as his hopes of winning the Tour de France faded.

"We lost two minutes today. As we all know, they are super strong. But I'm happy to be in the mix and tomorrow is another day."