Incredible attack at the Tour de France: Pogacar doesn’t hesitate for long and leaves Vingegaard standing at the Tourmalet

The Slovenian superstar won the mountain finish after the first high mountain stage and confidently crossed the iconic Col du Tourmalet after 186.2 kilometers between Pau and Gavarnie-Gédre by more than 2:30 minutes ahead of his long-term rival Jonas Vingegaard and teammate Isaac del Toro. The German star Florian Lipowitz came sixth on the day.

“An incredible victory, one of the sweetest,” said Pogacar after the race. He is among the top five in his appearances on the Tour of France. He often had to think back to his broken hand on the Tourmalet and had a few “flashbacks”. “It wasn’t about seconds in my mind,” he said of the increased distance. “I just wanted to go all the way.”

But Lipowitz had to watch as the 27-year-old Pogacar overcame all of his direct competitors with an explosive attack almost 45 kilometers from the finish on the Tourmalet and a long solo ride. He also celebrated his 23rd stage victory in the Tour of France. “There’s not much you can do with the performance,” Lipowitz said appreciatively about Pogacar on ARD. “I think we have to fight for third place now.”

Torstein Traeen, who was surprisingly in yellow for two days, was no longer able to follow on the Tourmalet. To make matters worse, the Norwegian fell while descending the mountain and had to be treated. But for the Scandinavian things continued later.

In the overall standings, Pogacar is 2:42 minutes ahead of the Dane Vingegaard. The Mexican del Toro is now in third place, 3:27 minutes behind Pogacar. German professional Florian Lipowitz improved from eleventh to seventh place – exactly four minutes behind Pogacar.

While French President Emmanuel Macron followed part of the stage with Tour boss Christian Prudhomme, the strong Pogacar demoralized the competition as more and more of his pursuers had to give up. Early in the climb to the Tourmalet, yellow-carrier Traeen fell back.

Five kilometers from the top of the Tour giant, Pogacar attacked on the mountain, flanked by thousands of fans, and left his direct competitors behind, including Vingegaard and Lipowitz. Especially on the descent from the Tourmalet, Vingegaard was unable to follow and the gap continued to grow. Lipowitz’s colleague Remco Evenepoel also fell significantly behind on his dreaded mountain, but came back later.

Impressive mountain panorama, waterfalls, winding roads: the residents of the municipality of Gavarnie-Gédre got the taste of experiencing a stage of the tour in their homeland for the first time. The professional cyclists were faced with two demanding challenges: the Col d’Aspin at 1,489 meters and the Pyrenean giant Tourmalet – a climb in the highest category with an average gradient of 7.3 percent over 17.1 kilometers.

Lipowitz cannot follow Vingegaard

Lipowitz’s teammate Evenepoel doesn’t have good memories of the Tourmalet. Last year he dropped out on the 14th stage of the Tour after being left behind during the climb to the mountain and shortly afterwards finished the tour exhausted.

Before the stage there was speculation to what extent the four-time Tour champion and overall victory favorite Pogacar would shorten his gap of almost eight minutes to the Norwegian Traeen. On the first tricky climb, the Col d’Aspin, it became clear that the Pogacar team was aiming for the day’s victory.

The day before, Pogacar’s closest rival Vingegaard experienced a shocking moment when he was involved in a crash on the stage designed for sprinters. However, the 29-year-old grabbed a teammate’s bike and reached the finish without wasting any time.

Despite the mountain stage, the professionals went to work at enormous speed. Before the second categorized climb, the average speed was around 48 kilometers per hour – well ahead of the highest estimated travel time. The later spectacular Pogacar show matched this.

On Friday the sprinters will be in demand again among the tour professionals. From Hagetmau, the field of drivers travels 175.1 kilometers over the flat route to the wine metropolis of Bordeaux. Extreme temperatures of up to 40 degrees are expected again.