Richard Virenque of France won the 13-mile climb up to the Courchevel summit Sunday - with overall leader Jan Ullrich right behind - to capture the 14th stage of the Tour de France.
As the pair pulled away from the others, they staged a one-on-one battle up the final climb. While Virenque showed the effort and applied the pace, Ullrich trailed closely behind. Ullrich calmly sat back, only occasionally standing up on his pedals.At one point, Virenque asked the German to take over the pace-setting, but Ullrich politely refused, saying he didn't want to work for Virenque.
In the final stretch, when it looked like Ullrich could go ahead whenever he wanted, Virenque applied a final sprint to stay in the lead.
Fernando Escartin of Spain took third, less than a minute behind.
The other top names of the pack, including Marco Pantani who took Saturday's l'Alpe d'Huez stage, were minutes behind.
Since Monday, Ullrich has taken two firsts, two seconds and a fourth to put the title - barring injury or mishap in the final week - virtually out of reach.
"I'm pleased that I was able to do well in the two big Alp stages," Ullrich said. "I am happy I didn't lose any time to Richard."
In fact, he gained 40 seconds on Saturday in Saturday's stage. In the overall standings, Ullrich still has a 6-minute, 22-second lead over Virenque, who took his third stage of the race.
Virenque still thinks he has a chance. "The Tour isn't over yet," he said. "There is still tomorrow."
The 91.9-mile 14th stage contained three major climbs.
After the first, Virenque left with a few teammates from Festina and built up an 87-second advantage over Ullrich.
"I asked the team last night to make a big effort to see if we can win the Tour," Virenque said.
However as Virenque's teammates dropped off one-by-one, Ullrich was gaining Telekom teammates, including last year's winner, Bjarne Riis, to help pace him back.
By the time they reached the 6,540-foot top of the second mountain Madeleine, Virenque had only a 20-second margin over Ullrich.
On the downhill, Virenque was caught by the others and it quickly became a two-rider race.
Up the final climb to the 6,540-foot top of Courchevel, Virenque and Ullrich were alone with 9.3-miles remaining. Both tried brief accelerations, but gave up quickly when the other would respond to it.
Ullrich stayed close, preferring not to risk anything, especially with his large overall lead.
Riis is in third place, 11:06 behind after finishing fifth on Sunday.
There are two more days in the Alps with four more mountains rated "first category" or "out of category" on a scale measuring height, steepness and difficulty.
There is another time trial around Disneyland Paris, July 26. The 21-stage race, covering 2,455 miles, concludes on July 27 on the Champs Elysees.