Portugal's João Almeida finished second in the time trial to extend his overall lead to 26 seconds ©Getty Images

France’s Rémi Cavagna of Deceuninck-Quick-Step won the individual time trial on the penultimate stage of the Tour de Pologne, with team mate João Almeida closing in on a maiden stage-race victory after extending his lead in the general classification.

Cavagna completed the time trial in 22min 10sec in Katowice, with Almeida a further 13 seconds back in second.

The Portuguese rider had seen his cushion at the top of the general classification reduced to two seconds by Slovenia’s Matej Mohorič of Bahrain Victorious yesterday, but his nearest challenger finished stage six in ninth and 18 seconds slower.

Mohorič now trails Almeida by 26 seconds thanks to the six-second bonus for coming second today.

Poland’s Michał Kwiatkowski of Ineos Grenadiers moved onto the podium in the general classification, finishing fifth in the time trial with a time of 22:29 to leapfrog Italy’s Diego Ulissi of UAE Team Emirates.

Ulissi could only finish 14th in the time trial, and will now need to overcome a 10-second deficit with Kwiatkowski if he is to finish the tour in the top three.

Another Pole, Bora–Hansgrohe’s Maciej Bodnar finished third in the time trial with a time of 22:26, with Denmark’s Mikkel Bjerg of UAE Team Emirates a further two seconds behind in fourth.

Almeida is now also top of the sprint classification by a single point as he and Kwiatkowski leapfrogged Mohorič, who is four points behind the Portuguese cyclist on 80 points.

There was no change in the mountain classification, with Łukasz Owsian of Poland and ProTeam Arkéa-Samsic still leading the way on 50 points ahead of Emīls Liepiņš of Latvia and Trek-Segafredo on 30.

The final stage of the Tour de Pologne takes place tomorrow, a 145-kilometre route from Zabrze to Kraków.