Image caption, Pogacar is set for a fifth Tour win - but Carapaz, right, will take the king of the mountains polka dot jersey Published 4 minutes ago Tadej Pogacar is set to secure a record-equalling fifth Tour de France after a dramatic stage 20 saw Ecuador's Richard Carapaz clinch victory on Alpe d'Huez as Sepp Kuss crashed twice while leading in the last few kilometres.
If Pogacar avoids a race-ending crash on Sunday's final stage to Paris, in which the overall standings are traditionally not contested, he will become the joint-most successful rider in the Tour's history alongside Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain.
Pogacar, 27, of UAE Team Emirates-XRG, finished the three-week Grand Tour's 'queen' stage in fourth place after helping his Mexican team-mate Isaac del Toro provisionally seal third place on the overall podium and the young rider classification's white jersey.
Pogacar will claim his fifth overall yellow jersey in Paris by six minutes and 26 seconds over Belgium's Remco Evenepoel of Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe, after Evenepoel finished the stage in second, 26 seconds behind Carapaz, after a late charge.
Race organisers ASO announced during the stage that Sunday's finale will have its distance reduced from 133km to 89km after the re-direction of emergency services to help tackle devastating wildfires in the south-west of the country.
Traditionally, the final stage sees the sport's sprinters battle for the line on the famous Champs Elysees cobbles, but a new section over Montmartre allows riders with more sustained power the potential to steal a breakaway win.
Image caption, Riders took big risks on the descents of the mountains 1 of 5 Slide 1 of 5, Sepp Kuss, Sepp Kuss crashed twice and nearly fell off a cliffEnd of image gallery A double crash that so nearly ended in disaster The most demanding stage of the whole race was left to the penultimate day, in which riders had to climb 5,450 metres across three hors category climbs covering 170.9km to finish in the iconic Alpe d'Huez ski-resort for a second time in two days.
American Kuss of Visma-Lease a Bike was part a large early breakaway which contained riders looking for a stage win, and attacked alone with about 25km to go.
The 31-year-old looked to have found the strength which helped him win the Vuelta a Espana in 2023 and seemed set to hold on to a slender lead for victory.
But the often unflappable Kuss was on the ragged edge and crashed on a right-hand corner after getting his line wrong, his rear wheel sliding on dust at the edge of the road before coming to a stop half off his bike and leaning into safety netting which prevented him from falling down a sheer drop.
He maintained his lead that time but soon crashed again coming out of a tunnel approaching Alpe d'Huez town and the tenacious Carapaz, of EF Education-Easypost, swept past Kuss and into the lead as the American.
Carapaz, the 2019 Giro d'Italia winner, took his second stage win in three days and also secured victory in the king of the mountains competition.
Typically, on a stage such as this one in the French Alps, Pogacar would be expected to deliver yet another masterclass but he held back to help Del Toro, who at one point was starting to struggle on the Col du Galibier, to defend his white jersey and third place overall from French sensation Paul Seixas of Decathlon CMA-CGM.
The 19-year-old Seixas finally ran out of energy on the final mountain of the race and is set to finish fourth in the general classification, 11 minutes and 56 seconds down on Pogacar's overall time.
Britain's Tom Pidcock of Pinarello-Q36.5 finished the stage 16th, nine minutes and three seconds down, and will finish ninth overall in the GC.
Denmark's Mads Pedersen of Lidl-Trek will win the green points jersey in Paris on Sunday just by finishing as he leads Belgium's Jasper Philipsen of Alpecin-Premier Tech by an uncatchable 82 points.
