The Tour de France is a race that can change overnight, and Brandon McNulty has experienced that first hand. UAE Team Emirates - XRG has just lost one of its most important domestiques to illness at the Tour, as the team's mountain block disintegrates around Tadej Pogacar and Isaac del Toro. On sta...

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Stage 18 of the Tour de France saw the riders go back into the Alps, with a stage that didn't see differences created in the fight for the yellow jersey however. Tadej Pogacar enjoyed a calmer day, but the true worries come due to health. Today, Pogacar lost Brandon McNulty; whilst two other teammat...

First, Brandon McNulty abandoned, 24km from the finish of stage 18. He couldnt continue anymore. An hour later, Tadej Pogaar, dressed in his yellow jersey but curiously in black shorts (you can join the dots), crossed the line in the GC group, flanked by Isaac Del Toro. UAE Team Emirates-XRGs main men were fine. But for the first time all Tour de France, they had no support around them.Felix Groschartner was next from the UAE team to be welcomed by his team's soingeurs at Orcires-Merlette, but he stopped at the top and turned straight around. He wasnt going to answer questions about the stomach virus in the camp.Ten minutes later, Nils Politt arrived. He looked fine but neither was he in the game for fluffy comments: he was going to be honest and realistic UAE have a problem.We have to survive the next two days now, Politt said. It is a major setback for us as a team, he said of McNultys exit. Pogaar echoed those sentiments: We will miss him the next two days, obviously.Eleven minutes afterwards, Adam Yates struck down by the bug and vomiting since Tuesday finished the stage, but hunched over his handlebars, he was pale-skinned and exhausted. He was not in a good way. Pogaar expressed confidence yesterday and today that Yates would recover in time for the high Alps but on this evidence, Yates is regressing, not progressing. "We hope Adam felt much better today as well. He fell behind simply to save energy for the next two days," Politt added. That might be true, but if this was Yates recovering, hes going to need a miracle to be a useful aid to Pogaar on the back-to-back ascents of Alpe dHuez.Like Groschartner, Yates refused to speak. A warm coat was put on him for the 15km ride back down to the teams bus. He would have freewheeled down from Orcires-Merlette, but it was more time spent on the bike when his body needs complete rest.Florian Vermeersch arrived four minutes after Yates, and though he looked better than his teammate and also spoke briefly to the assembled media curious as to the state of the teams health, his skinsuit was also stained by salt marks.He too headed down the mountain, and he would have passed Tim Wellens who only just made the time cut by two minutes. The Belgian, like Yates, is similarly run down with the same stomach virus. Usually, UAE team boss Mauro Gianetti is at the finish line of every stage, ready to greet his riders. This time he wasnt. In his press conference with the written media, Pogaar only had time for three questions there are normally five and one of them he answered in one-word; these days Pogaar tends to give lengthy answers.Those two observations Gianettis absence and Pogaars few words may mean nothing, but the struggles, body language and admissions of illness from his teammates suggest that multiple UAE riders are being afflicted by the stomach virus. At the worst possible time.With just three days to go, Pogaar has an advantage of 4:32 in the GC to Remco Evenepoel, a lead that was presumed unassailable. But all of a sudden, victory looks a tiny bit less sure. Illness is the one great uncontrollables that not even UAEs money can control. Will a third week virus either directly by Pogaar falling ill or indirectly due to his sick teammates being unable to support him so cruelly deny the Slovenian? Evenepoel and Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe can sense an opportunity.Thank goodness Isaac and Tadej are feeling good, and so are Felix and I, Politt added. We are trying to separate ourselves from the team as much as possible in order to simply minimise the risk. Many riders are ill in the bunch you hear from every team that theres something going around. That is simply part of three weeks. Ive never got to the end of a Tour without sick hands.Vermeersch said hes struggling with an injury rather than illness Its not a problem for me, he stated but the same cannot be said for his Belgian compatriot Wellens. Tim is really out of sorts, Vermeersch admitted. Ever the optimist, however, Pogaar turned spin doctor: yes, UAE are affected, but so too is everyone else. I think we can manage it, he said. Its the third week. All teams are suffering a bit.Bodies are everywhere on a stage like today. We will survive the stage tomorrow, try to come to Alpe dHuez and see what we can do. We will keep fighting and I believe we can do it.The road will tell.

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Tom Pidcock will focus on general classification for the rest of the Tour de France, he said, after his attempts to get into the break on stage 18 failed.The Pinarello Q36.5 rider, who sits eighth overall at the Tour, a result which would be his best ever finish at the French Grand Tour, said post-stage that any attempt from him to get up the road was closed down on Thursday."It wasn't possible to get in the break, no-one wanted me there," the 26-year-old said. "I already know from before the race that I was on people's black lists to not get in the break. I wanted to try one more time, but I guess now [I will] focus on the GC until Paris."The man from Leeds has been in the break four times at this year's race: stage nine to Ussel, where he finished third, stage 13 to Belfort, where he again finished third, and then the twin stages last weekend, 14 and 15, where he went up the road to build a buffer before the final climb. However, with just two more stages to come, both finishing up Alpe d'Huez, it is tricky to see a situation where Pidcock will be allowed up the road until Paris. However, his top 10 seems incredibly secure, with the Q36.5 rider having over 11 minutes on ninth-placed Jordan Jegat (TotalEnergies).On Thursday, Pidcock finished with the yellow jersey group, 4:35 behind stage winner Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost), who moved up to 10th overall as a result. "[It was] not an easy day, but the last climb was fairly controlled I think," Pidcock said. "When Carapaz is up the road, I have too much respect for this guy to give him free time. You don't give him free time."The other story of the day was illness at UAE Team Emirates-XRG, which Pidcock played down having a great effect on the battle for yellow, despite Brandon McNulty abandoning the race."It's not good for them, they definitely weren't in a good way today," he said. "But I think, to be honest, these next two days, it's about the other teams fighting for the podium. I don't think UAE will have that much work to do."

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