Froome all-but completes fourth Tour de France win after Marseille time trial

Chris Froome is poised to win the Tour de France for the fourth time in five years after building upon his advantage in the general classification at the penultimate stage in Marseille.

Team Sky rider Froome completed Saturday's 22.5-kilometre individual time trial in 28 minutes and 21 seconds, six seconds adrift of stage winner Maciej Bodnar (Bora-Hansgrohe), but enough to all but assure him of finishing in the yellow jersey for the third year in succession.

Providing he ends the final stage without a hiccup, the 32-year-old will be one short of matching the record for most Tour wins jointly held by Miguel Indurain, Bernard Hinault, Eddy Merckx and Jacques Anquetil.

Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) and Rigoberto Uran (Cannondale) failed to close the 23-second gap to Froome in Friday's 222.5km ride – the longest stage of this year's tour – and that proved costly, with the Kenya-born Brit moving 54 seconds clear by recording Saturday's third-quickest time.

Bodnar set the pace with an impressive time of 28:15 and Michal Kwiatkowski (Team Sky) failed to knock him off the top of the leaderboard despite being faster through the first two checkpoints, though the Pole still finished the stage second.

The challenges of Uran and Bardet looked over by the first checkpoint, but the Colombian did enough to move the Frenchman and take second in the GC.

Bardet was roared home in the Stade Velodrome and managed to hold onto a podium position by keeping a one-second advantage over Mikel Landa (Team Sky), but the noise quickly turned to boos as Froome followed him over the line.

Froome was just two seconds slower than Kwiatkowski at Palais du Pharo and three adrift after the climb to the Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde cathedral, but he was unable to mount a late push for his first stage victory this year.

Regardless, the Team Sky rider had done enough to maintain his dominance of the Tour for another edition.

GOOD DAY / BAD DAY

Landa gave everything he could to try and secure a top-three finish in the penultimate stage and a time of 29:06 put him in the top 15 performers on the day.

Despite the support of the home crowd, Bardet's struggles were clear from the outside as he lagged behind leader Bodnar by 45 seconds at the first checkpoint and one minute and 17 seconds after the only climb.

The Frenchman found enough in the final split to deny Landa a place on the podium by just one second.

STAGE CLASSIFICATION

1. Maciej Bodnar (Bora-Hansgrohe) 28:15

2. Michal Kwiatkowski (Team Sky) +0:01

3. Chris Froome (Team Sky) +0:06

GENERAL CLASSIFICATION 

1. Chris Froome (Team Sky) 83:55:16

2. Rigoberto Uran (Cannondale) +0:54

3. Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) +2:20

POINTS CLASSIFICATION 

1. Michael Matthews (Team Sunweb) 364 points

2. Andre Greipel (Lotto Soudal) 204 points

3. Edvald Boasson Hagen (Dimension Data) 200 points

KING OF THE MOUNTAINS 

1. Warren Barguil (Team Sunweb) 169 points

2. Primoz Roglic (Lotto NL-Jumbo) 80 points

3. Thomas De Gendt (Lotto Soudal) 64 points

NEXT UP...

The Tour finishes with a 103km ride from Montgeron to the centre of Paris, with the sprinters to battle for the final stage victory down the Champs-Elysees.