Rui Costa continued his and Movistar's impressive showing at this year's Tour de France when the Portuguese today doubled his stage win tally in the race by taking another dominant solo win on the second of three consecutive stages in the Alps. Behind the lone Movistar rider, Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) was the only GC rider to make an attack but it all came to nothing and so there was mostly ceasefire between the favourites on the eve of the decisive stage to Annecy-Semnoz.

Rui Costa may have hoped to finish in the top 10 on GC but despite losing out on that ambition in the crosswinds, he can declare his Tour de France a huge success. Having already taken a stage win in Gap on Tuesday, he doubled his tally today as he took a win in totally similar fashion to his first one.

Having been one of 47 riders to escape the peloton on the day's first climb, he saved his legs as the group gradually whittled down before finally striking on the day's final climb. He passed Pierre Rolland (Europcar) who had been the lone leader for most of the day and soloed across the line in very impressive fashion while veteran Andreas Klöden (Radioshack) proved that there is still life in his old legs as he took a fine 2nd place.

Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) was the only one among the GC riders to try an attack but as his direct rivals were all able to respond, it all came to nothing and a sizeable group crossed the line together. Hence, there was no change to the top 7 on GC on the eve of the decisive mountain stage to Annecy-Semnoz.

The mammoth 204,5km stage to Le Grand Bornand was by some described as the toughest in the entire race as it contained no less than 5 big climbs. On paper, it looked like one for a breakaway and so the start was really aggressive.

One of the first riders to attack was Lars Bak (Lotto-Belisol) who was joined by Ion Izagirre (Euskaltel) to form a front duo. Behind, a very big chase group had gradually formed as they hit the bottom of the Col du Glandon after 14km of racing.

Ryder Hesjedal (Garmin-Sharp) was part of that group and he launched an attack from the bottom of the climb. He bridged the gap to the front duo and while Izagirre was able to match his speed, Bak fell back to the chase group.

From the peloton, numerous riders went off the front while Sky was content to ride a steady tempo on the front of the peloton. As usual, Geraint Thomas and Ian Stannard were responsible for the early pace-setting and the sprinters were certainly happy to realize that the British team only rode a modest tempo up the steep climb.

As Hesjedal made a small acceleration to crest the summit in first position, a mammoth 45-rider group had formed behind. With Alessandro De Marchi, Kristijan Koren, Moreno Moser (all Cannondale), Bak, Bart De Clercq and Jurgen Roelandts (all Lotto), Steve Morabito, Amael Moinard and Marcus Burghardt (all BMC), Jan Bakelants, Klöden and Laurent Didier (all Radioshack), Rolland and Jerome Cousin (Europcar), Francesco Gavazzi (Astana), Alexandre Geniez (FDJ), Blel Kadri, Christophe Riblon and Romain Bardet (all Ag2r), Jesus Hernandez and Sergio Paulinho (Saxo-Tinkoff), Aliaksandr Kuchynski and Alberto Losada (Katusha), Mikel Nieve, Ruben Perez and Romain Sicard (Euskaltel), Costa, Jose Joaquin Rojas and Ruben Plaza (Movistar), Jerome Coppel and Daniel Navarro (Cofidis), Jose Serpa, Damiano Cunego and Elia Favilli (Lampre), Tony Martin (Omega Pharma-Quick Step), Lars Petter Nordhaug and Robert Gesink (Belkin), Cameron Meyer (Orica-GreenEdge), Tom Dumoulin and Simon Geschke (Argos-Shimano), Johnny Hoogerland and Juan Antonio Flecha (Vacansoleil) and Julien Simon, Brice Feillu and Maxime Mederel (Sojasun) in that group, only Sky had no rider up the road. Riblon beat Moser and Rolland to take 3rd at the top of the climb.

Those three riders decided to continue their attack on the descent but Cunego and later also Flecha managed to bridge the gap. Those 5 riders cooperated well to open up a solid gap on the big chase group as they headed along the short stretch of flat road between the Glandon and the Col de la Madeleine.

Surprisingly, the Omega Pharma-Quick Step trio Michal Kwiatkowski, Jerome Pineau and Mark Cavendish built up a gap of more than a minute on the descent but they had no intentions of continuing their effort and gradually fell back into the peloton which was still led by Stannard and Thomas.

As the front group started to climb the Madeleine, Izagirre quickly fell off the pace while Cunego, Flecha, Moser and Riblon decided to wait for their chasers. However, Rolland refused to give up and he rode the climb at a fast pace, quickly overtaking Izagiree.

Behind Costa made an attack and only Serpa and Bakelants wer able to respond. Nieve, Didier, Navarro, Bakelants, De Clercq, Plaza, Klöden and Hernandez formed a group a little further behind and they gradually clawed their way back up to Costa, Bakelants and Serpa who had by now caught Izagirre.

The gap to the peloton was now more than 12 minutes and while Thomas and Stannard had upped the pace a little which created some separation at the back of the peloton, they were not able to reduce the gap at all.

Rolland caught Hesjedal and those two cooperated well on the final part of the climb with Rolland taking maximum points at the summit. Behind, the chase group grew in size as more and more riders managed to rejoin the group.

As the peloton crested the summit, Saxo-Tinkoff could see that their lead in the teams classification had now come under threat. They put Nicolas Roche and later also Matteo Tosatto and Paulinho who had fallen back from the break, on the front in an attempt to reduce the gap to the bug chase group.

In that group most of the work was done by Euskaltel and Cofidis who made a big effort to set up their leaders Nieve and Navarro respectively. At one point, they were more than 2 minutes behind but in the valley they managed to reduce their deficit to just a little more than a minute.

On the third climb, the Col de Tamié, Hesjedal fell off the pace and the Canadian was quickly picked up by the chase group in which Sicard did almost all the work. However, Rolland was pedaling smoothly and on the top, he had extended his advantage to two minutes.

Tosatto really put down the hammer in the peloton which now splintered into pieces. It did no good to the non-climbers when Roche took over a little later and the gap to the leaders now started to come down rapidly.

On the penultimate climb, Coppel was the rider to do the most work in the chase group which managed to keep the gap rather stable between the one and two minute marks. Behind, Roche still set a very hard tempo as the peloton constantly picked up remnants from the very big early break.

In the valley between the final two climbs of the day, Movistar decided to go all in for Costa, and Rojas did a huge work with Coppel to minimize the gap. As they hit the bottom of the Col de la Croix Fry, Rolland was only 50 seconds ahead and his gap came down rapidly now.

Navarro launched an attack from the bottom and at first, only Nieve, Bakelants, De Clercq and Costa could respond. Gradually, Klöden managed to draw most of the group back together before history repeated itself as Navarro made another attempt and was joined by Nieve, Bakelants, De Clercq, Costa and Serpa before Klöden once again neutralized everything.

Costa was the next to strike and no one was able to match the fabulous Portuguese. He quickly opened up a big gap over a group consisting of Klöden, Bakelants, Nieve, Navarro and De Clercq. With 19,8km to go, he caught Rolland and while the Frenchman was able to match his speed for a while, he fell off the pace another 500m up the road.

Rolland was quickly overtaken by the chase group from which Nieve had now been dropped. However, they only lost time to Costa who crested the summit with a 1.15 gap on his rivals.

Klöden attacked on the descent and mostly held a stable 1 minute gap between himself and Costa but he never got any closer. The win was never in doubt and Costa had plenty of time to celebrate his third ever stage win at the Tour.

Klöden took second while Bakelants beat Geniez - who had rejoined the chase group - to take 3rd. During the next 8 minutes, the remnants of the breakaway gradually rolled across the line.

In the peloton, Michael Rogers took over the pace-setting at the bottom of the climb. His work was disrupted when Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) launched an attack while John Gadret (Ag2r) went off a little later. Those two formed a strong duo that stayed 15 seconds ahead of the peloton for some time.

Rogers had now fallen off the pace and so his teammate Roman Kreuziger now set the pace. Kwiatkowski and Laurens Ten Dam (Belkin) who like Rogers had started the day in the top 10, all dropped off the pace.

Finally, one of the podium contenders tried a move as Rodriguez made an attack. Nairo Quintana (Movistar), Alberto Contador (Saxo-Tinkoff) and race leader Chris Froome (Sky) could all respond and those riders merged with Valverde and Gadret to form a sextet that crested the summit together.

Valverde and Gadret attacked over the top while the Froome group almost came to a standstill. That allowed many riders to rejoin from behind until Kreuziger and Contador finally decided to up the pace on the descent.

Valverde sprinted to the line to gain as much time as possible but he and Gadret were caught just as they crossed the line. As Ten Dam, Rogers and Kwiatkowski all lost time, it was, however, enough for the Spaniard to move into 9th on GC.

The biggest winner in the general classification was, however, Navarro who moved from 13th to 8th by virtue of his presence in the day's breakaway. There was no change in the top 5 and so Froome takes his healthy 5.11 lead over Contador into tomorrow's decisive mountain stage to Annecy-Semnoz.

Starting at 13.30, you can follow that stage in its entirety on CyclingQuotes.com/live.

Result:

1. Rui Costa 5.59.01

2. Andreas Klöden +0.48

3. Jan Bakelants +1.44

4. Alexandre Geniez +1.52

5. Daniel Navarro +1.55

6. Bart De Clercq +1.58

7. Robert Gesink +2.03

8. Alessandro De Marchi +2.05

9. Mikel Nieve +2.16

10. Ruben Plaza +2.44

General classification:

1. Chris Froome 77.10.00

2. Alberto Contador +5.11

3. Nairo Quintana +5.32

4. Roman Kreuziger +5.44

5. Joaquin Rodriguez +5.58

6. Bauke Mollema +8.58

7. Jakob Fuglsang +9.33

8. Daniel Navarro +12.33

9. Alejandro Valverde +14.56

10. Michal Kwiatkowski +16.08

Points classification:

1. Peter Sagan 380

2. Mark Cavendish 278

3. Andre Greipel 227

4. Marcel Kittel 177

5. Alexander Kristoff 157

Mountains classification:

1. Chris Froome 104

2. Pierre Rolland 103

3. Mikel Nieve 98

4. Nairo Quintana 97

5. Christophe Riblon 93

Youth classification:

1. Nairo Quintana 77.15.32

2. Michal Kwiatkowski +10.36

3. Andrew Talansky +10.52

4. Romain Bardet +19.21

5. Tom Dumoulin +1.18.11

Teams classification:

1. Team Saxo-Tinkoff  230.46.30

2. Radioshack +3.39

3. Ag2r +7.37

4. Movistar +15.51

5. Belkin +29.24