Frenchman Jerome Coppel of the Française des Jeux team and Italian Angelo Furlan of Lampre pulled out of the Tour de France during the race’s 12th stage on Thursday.

The pair were later joined by Frenchman Roman Feillu of the Agritubel team.

Furlan was the first to pull out the race, shortly after the peloton had set an imposing pace of 47.9km for the first hour of racing.

An hour later the Italian was followed by Coppel who abandoned before the halfway point of the 211.5 km ride from Tonnerre to Vittel.

Feillu, who wore the race’s yellow jersey for a day last year and whose younger brother Brice won the race’s first stage in the mountains, to Arcalis in Andorra, began struggling early in the race.

After three hours of racing he had a 15-minute deficit to the main peloton and pulled out shortly after wards.

Earlier Thursday it was confirmed that Portuguese Rui Costa had left the race following a crash in Wednesday’s stage from Vatan to Saint-Fargeau.

The Caisse d’Epargne rider, competing in his first Tour, sustained ligament injury to his collarbone and was set for further scans in Portugal.