Tour de France: Chris Froome holds firm as Joaquim Rodriguez wins

Froome (Team Sky) spent the first 11 stages of the race on the front foot but that changed on the 15.8km ascent to the summit finish at Plateau de Beille on Thursday, when Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo), Vincenzo Nibali (Astana), Nairo Quintana (Movistar) and Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) each hit him with repeated attacks.

Every time, however, either Richie Porte (Team Sky), Geraint Thomas (Team Sky) or Froome himself chased the moves down and all of the pre-race favourites ended up crossing the line together.

Joaquim Rodriguez claimed his second stage win of the race with a solo triumph on Plateau de Beille

It means that Froome, who also had an attack of his own snuffed out, remains 2min 52sec ahead of second-placed Tejay van Garderen (BMC Racing) and 3min 9sec in front of third-placed Quintana in the general classification.

Thomas also managed to finish with the main group to remain fifth overall, 4min 3sec down on Froome and one place and one second in front of sixth-placed Contador.

Rodriguez, meanwhile, formed part of the day's 21-man breakaway but forged clear on his own with 7.5km of the final climb remaining and beat Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) into second place by 1min 12sec.

Geraint Thomas (right) helped protest Froome (in yellow) from his rivals' attacks

Rodriguez, who also won stage three, said: "I was definitely feeling on that last climb that I was in better condition than the other breakaway riders and I know this climb well, so I attacked. To win a stage of the Tour is so important to me. It's a long time since I won my first stage, back in 2010".

Stage 12 crested four categorised climbs on its 195km journey from Lannemezan to Plateau de Beille in the Pyrenees and was billed as the hardest of this year’s race.

A large and high-pedigree breakaway was allowed was allowed to go clear, but it broke apart on the day’s third climb and Rodriguez ultimately emerged as the strongest after dropping the dogged Fuglsang and then catching passing the then leader on the road, Michal Kwiatkowski (Etixx - Quick-Step), on the final climb.

Vincenzo Nibali showed hints of a return to form when he went on the attack

Back down the hill, Team Sky led the peloton up the first half of the ascent and although they set a fierce pace in a bid to deter attacks, it didn’t work. Contador and Nibali, both showing signs of a return to form, were the first two to make their moves, but each of them they were shut down by the outstanding Porte.

The Australian then snuffed out two accelerations from Valverde, but by now he was exhausted and when Quintana launched two back-to-back attacks, it was left to Thomas and then Froome himself to reel the Colombian back in.

From left, Nairo Quintana, Alberto Contador, Tejay van Garderen, Alejandro Valverde and Nibali all failed to drop Froome

Froome then tried a short-lived attack of his own and Quintana also had one last failed attempt, but there was no separating the favourites in what was a fierce battle yet ultimately a stalemate.

The Tour continues on Friday with a 198.5km rolling stage from Muret to Rodez. Follow it with our live blog from 1pm BST and find out more about the route in our race guide .