LA ROCHE-SUR-FORON • Primoz Roglic retained his lead on Slovenian compatriot Tadej Pogacar atop the Tour de France standings after Stage 18 as British outfit Ineos Grenadiers claimed a one-two finish yesterday.

Bedevilled by injury problems that saw them withdraw their captain and defending champion Egan Bernal on Wednesday, Polish teammate Michal Kwiatkowski won the stage, a 175km ride from Meribel, as Ecuador's Richard Carapaz took the King of the Mountains jersey.

The pair crossed the finish line two minutes ahead of the elite pack, as Belgian Wout van Aert took third place.

"I had the best legs ever, the way we rode together with Richard was just incredible," said Kwiatkowski, a former world champion.

"When Egan left the race, he was very sad but wished us well, and now we have this wonderful day. That's the Tour de France.

"This is an incredible day for us. I'll never forget that.

"I get nice moments in cycling but this one gave me goosebumps in the last kilometres, I don't know how many but the gap was so big that we knew we were going to make it...

"We put on some show today and we deserve a big celebration."

In the race for the overall standings, only tomorrow's individual time trial presents a chance for the second-placed Pogacar to stage a coup.

Roglic leads Pogacar by 57 seconds with today's Stage 19 and the culminating run up the Champs-Elysees on Sunday both set to be decided in a mass bunch sprint.

Stage 17 solo winner Miguel Angel Lopez of Colombia is still third, 1min 27sec off the lead, but is less of a time trial specialist than his rivals.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS