Frenchman Barguil takes Bastille Day Tour stage 13, Aru stays in yello

FOIX. KAZINFORM French cyclist Warren Barguil peeled away from the leading pack to clinch stage 13 of the 2017 Tour de France, a breathtaking mountain section that gave Italian climber Fabio Aru the edge over Briton Chris Froome, who failed to regain the coveted overall leader's yellow jersey as the riders wound their way into Foix, EFE reports.

On the occasion of his country's national holiday, Bastille Day, it was France's own Team Sunweb rider Barguil that brought the challenging mountain stretch to a close with 2 hours, 36 minutes and 29 seconds on the stopwatch, followed closely behind by Colombian Nairo Quintana (Movistar Team) and Spaniards Alberto Contador (Trek-Segafredo) and Mikel Landa (Team Sky).

Despite his best efforts, Team Sky's Froome was unable to make up for the time he lost during the final climb of stage 12, and Astana's Aru will kick start the next stage clad in that sought-after yellow jersey.

Stage 13 saw the riders tackle three category 1 summits over 101 kilometers (62 miles) of road that wound through the Pyrenees in what was the shortest non-time trial stage in this year's Tour.

Heading into the final descent, Barguil, Quintana, Contador, and Landa broke away from the yellow jersey group and managed to maintain a gap of just under 2 minutes heading into Foix.

Aru retained his 6 second lead over Froome in the general classifications with France's Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) staying in third, 25 seconds behind the Italian climber.

Saturday's stage 14 shall bring the riders to Blagnac for a 181.5 km run through the southwest French countryside to Rodez.