Tour de France 2019: Julian Alaphilippe storms to stage three victory with brilliant late solo break

Updates from stage three of the Tour

Tour de France: Stage two highlights

Julian Alaphilippe soloed to victory on stage three of the Tour de France to take the yellow jersey off Mike Teunissen.

The Deceuninck-Quick Step rider attacked on the final categorised climb of the 215km stage from Binche to Epernay and raced clear to take the win 26 seconds ahead of the pack, which was led over the line by Team Sunweb's Michael Matthews.

With Jumbo-Visma's Teunissen having been dropped from the main pack, that was enough for Alaphilippe to take the yellow jersey for the first time in his career. Re-live the stage:

For Egan Bernal and Geraint Thomas, it was a good day in the black and red of Team Ineos, finishing second on the team time-trial and gaining significant time on rivals like Astana’s Jakob Fuglsang, who crashed on stage one, Adam Yates of Mitchelton-Scott and Romain Bardet.

But they lost 20 seconds to Jumbo-Visma’s Steven Kruijswijk, who is considered one of their main rivals for this Tour having finished fifth overall last year.

Potential stage winners

Julian Alaphillipe – A master of hilly stages like this one, Alaphilippe will be determined to pick up King of the Mountains points, but he may find that this route is not quite brutal enough to leave behind rivals with a faster finish.

Wout van Aert – Another one of Jumbo-Visma’s brilliant stable of riders who specialises in this kind of one-day challenge.

Greg van Avermaet – The Belgian is currently in the polka dots but could have sights on an upgrade to the yellow jersey here if he can escape up the road and win the stage.

Alejandro Valverde – The reigning road race world champion suffered a little in yesterday’s team time-trial but this is the kind of opportunist’s day in which he thrives.

Key Points

• Highlights: Team Ineos finish second in team time-trial on stage 2
• Stage 3 is 215km route from Binche in Belgium to Epernay in France

[8 July 2019 15:56 · Lawrence Ostlere]

3km to go: Alaphilippe descends rapidly into the finish, and he is not holding anything back here...

[8 July 2019 15:58 · Lawrence Ostlere]

1km to go: Still half a minute clear, surely Alaphilippe is going to pull this off now...

[8 July 2019 15:59 · Lawrence Ostlere]

Julian Alaphilippe wins stage three!

A brilliant solo break by Alaphilippe from 15km out and no one could cope with the Frenchman. He wins the stage and the yellow jersey. Stunning performance from a world-class rider. 

[8 July 2019 16:02 · Lawrence Ostlere]

There's a dash for the podium spots and bonus seconds for coming second and third, with Greg van Avermaet pushed out on the line by Michael Matthews.

[8 July 2019 16:06 · Lawrence Ostlere]

Top five

1. Julian Alaphilippe

2. Michael Matthews

3. Jasper Stuyven

4. Greg Van Avermaet

5. Peter Sagan

[8 July 2019 16:07 · Lawrence Ostlere]

Julian Alaphilippe celebrates his victory, and it means he will wear the yellow jersey for the first time in his career.