João Almeida wins Tour de Suisse stage 7 but can't shake off yellow jersey Kévin Vauquelin

João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) won stage 7 of the Tour de Suisse on the hilltop finale at Emmetten, but Kévin Vauquelin (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) put up a fine defence of his yellow jersey to maintain a lead of 33 seconds ahead of Sunday’s short final time trial.

Almeida won the sprint from a front group of five ahead of Oscar Onley (Picnic-PostNL), while Vauquelin took third place ahead of Felix Gall (Decathlon-AG2R) and Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor).

The winning move took shape on the penultimate ascent of Bürgenstock with 20km to go thanks to an attack from Gall. They picked off the remnant of the day’s early break, and Frank van den Broeck played a key role in towing the move to the foot on the final climb on behalf of Onley.

Gall opened the attacking on the short, sharp final climb, kicking with 3.2km to go, but Almeida controlled the yellow jersey group and dragged them up to the Austrian with a kilometre to go.

Vauquelin dared a long-range effort from 400m to go, and although Almeida and Onley came around him within sight of the line, the Frenchman is on the brink of final overall victory.

Almeida might be favoured to overhaul him, but the Portuguese rider downplayed the idea.

“I don’t think so. He is also very strong in the TT. It’s going to be tough but I’m going to give everything I have,” said Almeida, who has fought his way into GC contention despite losing more than three minutes on the opening day. “At this moment every second is important, and we have to do our best.”

There was a rapid start to proceedings on the penultimate day of the Tour de Suisse before the day’s early break of seven riders forged clear. The on-form Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek) was aboard, and the American champion was joined by Aleksandr Vlasov (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Junior Lecerf (Soudal-QuickStep), Felix Engelhardt (Jayco-Alula), Frank van den Broeck (Picnic-PostNL), Tiesj Benoot (Visma | Lease a Bike) and Hugo Houle (Israel Premier Tech).

They held a maximum lead of four minutes, but with Almeida’s UAE and Vauquelin’s Arkéa squads policing affairs behind, they were never going to be given too much leeway, and their advantage dropped to little over a minute ahead of the Bürgenstock (5.5 km at 7.9%) in the finale.

By then, Alaphilippe’s Tudor squad had taken up the reins, though the Frenchman’s anticipated attack never came. Instead it was Felix Gall who took up the initiative with a rasping attack that was countered by Onley, with Almeida, as ever, measuring his effort and bridging up soon afterwards, bringing Alaphilippe and Vauquelin with him.

That quintet joined Simmons and Van der Broeck at the front over the top, and the latter put in a mammoth stint of pacemaking for Onley to ensure the group reached the foot of the final climb (3.1 km at 7.8%) with half a minute on the chasers.

Gall, again, was the first to accelerate, while Almeida took up the chase behind with a steadily rising tempo that proved too much for Alaphilippe at one juncture. Alaphilippe showed resilience, however, to fight his way back up the front group beneath the flamme rouge, taking advantage of a moment’s hesitancy when Gall was caught.

Onley kicked with a little under 900m to go, but the Scot couldn’t get clear, and the race looked set to come down to a five-up sprint for the honours. When Vauquelin dropped to the back of the group, the yellow jersey appeared to be struggling but it was something of a pump fake – he unleashed a surprise acceleration with 400m to go that almost carried him to stage victory.

Almeida built up enough steam in the closing metres to come past for the stage win and put six seconds into Vauquelin in time bonuses, but the Portuguese rider has work to do to win the overall title.

The Tour de Suisse concludes on Sunday with an uphill time trial to Stockhütte. The discipline and the terrain will suit Almeida, winner of two stages this week, but Vauquelin has put up fierce resistance thus far and won’t be easily displaced.