Having suffered from bronchitis, Rui Costa has not had the Tour de France he was hoping for. The world champion has now been diagnosed with pneumonia and in order not to compromise the rest of his season, he has decided to abandon the race.

Rui Costa will not be in Carcassone this morning for the start of the 16th stage of this year's Tour de France.

The world champion, 13th in the overall standings, was forced to retire after an X-ray examination, carried out on the rest day at a clinic in Pezenas, showed an outbreak of pneumonia.

For the past week, Rui Costa has been suffering from bronchitis which was held in a stable phase after antibiotic therapy.

On the rest day however, the world champion woke up to a worse feeling than the past and a general state of fatigue. Accompanied by Dr. Beltemacchi, doctor of Team Lampre-MERIDA, Rui Costa was subjected to various tests and X-rays which led to the diagnosis and forced the doctor to take the decision for Costa not to continue in this years Tour de France.

Rui Costa was very willing to continue and respect the Tour and so he wanted to get through the night in order to assess his condition in the morning, but the persistent state of not feeling well and the risk of compromising the rest of the season has convinced the world champion to retire from the race.