Geraint Thomas survived a crash at the Tour de France to stay in touch with yellow jersey holder Julian Alaphilippe heading into stage 17. Australian Caleb Ewan won stage 16, his second of the tour, pipping Elia Viviani on the line in a bunch sprint finish in Nimes, with Dylan Groenewegen taking third.
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In the general classification there is no change, with Thomas still 95 seconds behind Alaphilippe, but he had to survive a scare when his gears jammed 130km from home. “I had one hand on the bars and the gears jumped and jammed and I got thrown off my bike on a corner,” Thomas said.
“I knew the race wasn’t on so I just got back into the group, it’s just frustrating. It was such a freak thing.” Astana’s Jakob Fuglsang, who started the day in ninth overall, was not so lucky and was forced to abandon the Tour after crashing with 27km remaining. Today’s stage heads from Pont du Gard to Gap, which is the last relatively flat stage before three gruelling days in the Alps.
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