Tour de France 2019 news - Geraint Thomas to 'go all in' - but Ineos don't want Egan Bernal battle

Stage 13 of the 2019 Tour de France is a 27.2km time trial around Pau with Deceuninck-Quickstep’s Julian Alaphilippe still in the maillot jaune and boasting a 1:12 lead in general classification.

However, the time trial plays more to the strengths of the Ineos duo – and with Thomas sitting second in GC and Bernal just a further four seconds down on his colleague, the Ineos pair will both be looking to try and make considerable gains on Alaphilippe.

With Ineos controlling the race very effectively thus far, a big time trial performance for either man could establish him as the de facto race favourite – though Portal insists they will not be allowing internal power battles to disrupt their performance.

"The time trial maybe suits Geraint better than it does Egan, so maybe you could expect Geraint to finish a bit higher on the rankings, but Egan has done some really good time trials this year – both in Paris-Nice and then at Suisse. The goal for both riders is to go as quick as they can," Portal told Cyclingnews.

"They just need to concentrate on their own rides. There's no point in them racing against each other or someone on GC. Then you make a mistake. They just need to keep on their track."

Speaking to Eurosport following the conclusion of Thursday’s Stage 11, , Thomas warned he was ready go “go all in”.

“I’m looking forward to tomorrow, a big day. I’ve seen the course a few times so I’ll ride it again in the morning.

"It's been quite hard, waiting and waiting, but tomorrow I'll get to go all in. It's going to be a big day.”