Tadej Pogacar is back in his element at the Tour de France. In the sixth stage, last year’s winner duped the competition and changed jerseys.
Defending champion Tadej Pogacar has shown the competition the limits with his second demonstration of his strength in 24 hours and stormed into the yellow jersey for the first time in the 109th Tour de France.
The 23-year-old Slovenian prevailed against his main rivals in a brilliant final sprint on Thursday on the longest stage of the Tour of France after 219.9 km from Binche to Longwy and underpinned his ambitions for the “Threepeat”.
Van Aert’s unorthodox racing tactics
In his seventh stage win at the Grand Boucle, the winner of the last two editions benefited from an unorthodox race tactic by Wout van Aert, who was severely defeated by a 140 km breakaway attempt in yellow in the demanding final phase.
In the overall standings, Pogacar is 31 seconds ahead of his now closest opponent, Jonas Vingegaard, who finished seventh. As a result, Pogacar is in an excellent starting position on Friday towards the first mountain finish at the Planches des Belles Filles. The best German on Thursday was Lennard Kämna in 33rd place.
Celebrity Guest
Before the start of the section from Belgium back to France, Belgium’s cycling icon Eddy Merckx paid his compatriot van Aert, who was starting in yellow, a visit at the start. Minutes later, the stage was tackled by the peloton at high speed. With anger in his stomach after his early fall on Wednesday, van Aert was repeatedly involved in speed increases, which Pogacar followed courageously.