In stage 11, a frustrated John Degenkolb won the sprint for second behind lone escapee Tony Gallopin. Today he repeated that feat when he was the fastest behind Ramunas Navardauskas in stage 19 after bad luck had taken away all the teammates that should have helped him close the gap in the finale.

John Degenkolb has taken his second runner’s up spot of Le Tour de France today on stage 19 at the end of a fast, wet and hectic finale into Bergerac. The stage mirrored Degenkolb’s earlier second place in the race where a solo rider broke clear on the last climb of the day to stay clear by a handful of seconds, with Degenkolb sprinting to second behind.

A large crash vastly reduced an already diminished front group, with Albert Timmer one of those caught up, but Degenkolb made it through safely to challenge at the finish, but on his own. Marcel Kittel lost contact on the day’s climb with just under 15km to race, a climb that saw many riders lose contact before a fast, wet run in to the finish, while other riders crashed and punctured on the approach to the hill leaving Degenkolb alone in the finish.

The 209km stage from Maubourguet val d’Adour to Bergerac was seen as one of two final sprint opportunities between the mountains and the end of the 2014 Tour. But it was unsure of who best the stage would suit between Degenkolb and Kittel depending on how each had recovered from the climbs, and then how each rider got over the climb of the day in the final 20km.

The majority of the stage was steady for Team Giant-Shimano with a five rider break out front, and the bunch holding a manageable gap behind. Ji pulled early on but with other teams also keen to get involved in the chase the burden was not left up to the team and they could save some strength for later in the stage.

The rain started to become heavier in the second half of the stage and conditions continued to deteriorate the closer they got to the finish. With 20km to race there was just one rider left ahead of the bunch with half a minutes advantage, dwindling fast.

With around 13km to go the climb started and the past pace running into the climb, as well as the frantic fight for position on the treacherous wet roads took its toll on Kittel, as well as many others and the peloton splintered.

At this point Team Giant-Shimano had already had a fair share of bad luck with Koen De Kort and Roy Curvers crashing on the run up to the climb. Then Tom Dumoulin, set to be one of Degenkolb's last helpers in the Power Sprint Formation, punctured just before the hill putting him too far back to help.

Degenkolb and Timmer were left in the front group over the top, but on the climb Ramunas Navardauskas (Garmin-Sharp) attacked and got a small gap which he built upon on the slippery descent the other side. Heading into the final three kilometres he still had 19 seconds advantage and a crash behind near the front of the bunch helped his cause as the chase was severely hampered.

A small group was left at the front to chase, but in the end they were fighting for second place and Degenkolb showed that he still has a good turn of speed in his legs after all the mountain climbing of the past week.

De Kort, Curvers and Timmer who was one of those involved in the late crash all finished the stage in good shape, just sore and bruised.

“The weather really was not normal today, it was really bad,” said Degenkolb after the finish. “My whole team was focused on doing a good job in supporting me and I was really happy to get this chance.

“Right from the beginning we said that we would go for it and the guys did a great job in keeping me out of trouble all day but late on things got really hectic.

“In the final a lot of guys crashed and I was very lucky that I didn’t come down too. I was on my own at the end though as my teammates either had crashes themselves, crashes in front of them, or punctures – I don’t think that I have ever seen so many flat tyres in the peloton in a race before!

“My legs were good today but for a flat sprint like the Champs Élysées we should focus on Marcel and I with the rest of the team will get him into the best possible position to try to repeat what we did last year.”

Team coach Aike Visbeek added: “The plan was to go for John today and we were planning on having Tom D, Albert, Roy and Koen with him as the last riders in the power sprint formation. But things started to go wrong in the last 20 kilometres when firstly Koen crashed, then Roy. Then Tom punctured just before the final climb and that was it for him too. Finally Albert crashed in the bunch with just under three kilometres to go leaving John on his own up front.

“John did well to make it through and did a strong sprint at the end but with the crashes there was no one to help close the gap. It is a big disappointment for both John and the team as we knew that we had a good card to play today on this stage. The team were strong though but we had too much bad luck to make it happen.”