DEFENDING CHAMPION TADEJ Pogacar soared into the Tour de France overall lead on Saturday on an Alpine stage won by Belgian Dylan Teuns as British outfit Ineos’s hopes were again battered.
This was a second stage win on the 2021 Tour for UAE’s Slovenian leader Pogacar who took another three minutes out of his most credible rival Ineos’ Ecuadorian Richard Carapaz.
Overnight leader Mathieu van der Poel went into a trademark ‘all or nothing at all’ meltdown and looks set drop out of the Tour as promised and jet off to Tokyo to contest the mountain bike gold.
Pogacar was again head and shoulders above the rest of the field.
With 13 stages remaining, he leads the Tour by 1min 48sec from Wout Van Aert, who is Jumbo’s main hope after Primoz Roglic’s misadventures with a fall and subsequent decline in form.
The 22-year-old Pogacar will wear the yellow jersey for only the second time on Sunday. He took control of the 2020 Tour on the penultimate day, but rather than bide his time on this raucous edition, he has seized control early.
The 150km run that culminated with the ascent and descent of a classic Tour climb the Colombier was the first of eight mountain stages. There were large weekend crowds in the Upper Savoy region known for Evian water, melted-cheese dishes and the Chamonix ski resort.
Ireland’s Dan Martin finished 56th in today’s stage.
Literally unbelievable.
@The Sports Derd: I was unfortunately thinking the same thing. I haven’t seen a performance like that since Armstrong’s famous stage to Sestriere. Having said that, Pog didn’t go on to win. Possibly because he already did enough to get yellow, so unlike Armstrong, there was no need to rub it in and make it obvious. Either the Pog is wise beyond his years or he is a true prodigy. Unfortunately the history of the sport in the past 30 years particularly, has robbed him of a lot of people believing in the nativity of prodigal youth. That’s the way I feel anyway, but I would love to be wrong. Some performance
@The Sports Derd: I was unfortunately thinking the same thing. I haven’t seen a performance like that since Armstrong’s famous stage to Sestriere. Having said that, Pog didn’t go on to win. Possibly because he already did enough to get yellow, so unlike Armstrong, there was no need to rub it in and make it obvious. Either the Pog is wise beyond his years or he is a true prodigy. Unfortunately the history of the sport in the past 30 years particularly, has robbed him of a lot of people believing in the naivety of prodigal youth. That’s the way I feel anyway, but I would love to be wrong. Some performance
Pogacar just on a different level,already seems like just a fight for minor places behind him. Can’t see Wout Van Aert really staying up there when going really gets tough,jumbo should be riding to get Vingegaard on podium from here out.
Great ride.