Durangoan Quinn Simmons was part of a small breakaway of five riders during Stage 19 of the Tour de France on Friday.
Another protest interrupted the race, but once it resumed, Simmons outsprinted the rest of the breakaway to win the intermediate sprint and score 20 points on the stage.
Simmons and fellow Durangoan Sepp Kuss of Team Jumbo-Visma are now tied with 22 points after Simmons moved up 51 spots with his performance Friday. Simmons attacked again and rode solo for a bit but eventually was caught by the peloton. After his early efforts, Simmons ended up finishing 121st on the stage.
Kuss, meanwhile, helped another teammate, Christophe Laporte, win the stage in 3 hours, 53 minutes and 4 seconds. It was the team’s fifth stage win of the Tour, with Wout Van Aert and Jonas Vingegaard each winning two.
Laporte also became the first Frenchman to win a Tour stage this year, which was the country’s first win in 38 stages.
The uphill finish in Cahors seemed right up Van Aert's alley, but the green jersey wearer sacrificed his chances for Laporte. The Frenchman saw his chance, jumped and caught three escapees in the final kilometers. After another acceleration, Laporte rode solo to his second season victory.
“This is the best day of my career,” Laporte said. “It's still hard to believe, but I'm super-happy with this victory and the confidence the team gave me. With 5 kilometers to go, Wout said: 'It's for you.'”
“Our main goal was to drop Jonas safely within the 3-kilometer mark and once we had achieved that, I got the green light to sprint,” Laporte said. “I went into the sprint early. I accelerated in the last corner and was surprised to see that I had a gap on the rest of the peloton. I made the connection with the three leaders and at 500 meters before the finish line, I decided to go full speed. When I looked behind, I didn't see anyone. It’s unbelievable that I won. This was my day.”
Jasper Philipsen of Alpecin-Deceuninck finished second, and Alberto Dainese of Team DSM crossed third, both one second after Laporte.
Vingegaard, meanwhile, held on to the general classification lead, crossing 13th in the same time as his closest competitor, Tadej Pogacar of UAE Team Emirates, who finished fifth (+0:01).
Kuss finished 51st on the stage (+0:57) and moved up one spot to 18th out of the 139 remaining cyclists in the GC (+58:55). Vingegaard is the only Jumbo-Visma cyclist ahead of Kuss in the GC.
Simmons moved down one spot down to 68th in the GC (+3:22:35), but won some hardware for his early efforts. Simmons also remained in 10th in the youth category, which Pogacar leads.
Only two stages remain in the Tour de France. Saturday’s stage is a 40-kilometer time trial while Sunday’s finale is a 116-kilometer flat stage that will finish in Paris.
