Tour de France 2023: Belfort - Le Markenstein - Fellering

Route Description: The 20th stage was from Belfort to Le Markenstein Fellering over 133.5 km. This stage was a short but mighty climbing stage with 6 rated climbs. The start in the beautiful citadel of Belfort was followed by some lead in kilometers that were going slightly uphill to the first climb of the day, the Category 2 Ballon d'Alsace. In the history of the Tour de France the Ballon d'Alsace was the first climb put on the route back in 1905. It precedes the Pyrennes and Alps by several years. The climb is 11.5km  at an average gradient of 5.2%. The descent of the Ballon d'Alsace was followed by approximately 20km of valley roads leading to the Category 2 Col de la Croix des Moinats. This climb was 5.2 km at 7%, and it was followed by a brief descent to the foot of the next climb. The Category 2 Col de Grosse Pierre was 3.2 km at an average gradient of 8%. The brief descent of the climb was followed by several kilometers of rolling terrain and the next climb. The col de la Schlucht was listed as a Category 3 climb with a 5.4% average gradient over 4.3 km. This was followed by an over 18 km descent to Munster and the foot of the Petit Ballon. Tbe first of two Category 1 climbs in the finale of the stage was the Petit Ballon. This climb was 9.3 km in length at 8.1%. The descent of the Petit Ballon led to the final climb of the day the Col du Platerwasel which has an 8.4% average gradient and is 7.1 km in length. The final eight kilometers after the climb were a false flat followed by a descent to Le Markenstein-Fellering.

Race Summary and Analysis:This stage started with a rollout from Belfort thru the historic Citadel. Once the race began, it was again raced at a breakneck pace. Victor Campanaerts and  Jasper De Buyst both Lotto-Dstny were the first attack to gain some distance on the peloton. De Buyst would not keep pace with Campanaerts who was able to start the Ballon d'Alsace before being caught and passed by a breakaway group that had formed. The initial six rider breakaway consisted of Giulio Ciccone and Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek), Krists Neilands (Israel-Premier Tech), Warren Barguil (Arkea-Samsic), Tom Pidcock (Ineos Grenadiers) and Maxime Van Gils (Lotto-Dstny). A counter-attack involved Thibaut Pinot, Valentin Madouas, Stefan Küng (Groupama-FDJ), Rigoberto Uran (EF Education-EasyPost), Chris Harper (Jayco-AlUla), Ion Izagirre (Cofidis) and Kevin Vermaerke (DSM-Firmenich). This breakaway would contest the first two climbs of the day which Ciccone would take the first position on each climb. In the peloton Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos-Grenadiers) and Sepp Kuss (Jumbo-Visma) would both crash in a turn on the descent of the Ballon d'Alsace. Video replay showed that Rodriguez slid out in the turn and Kuss had no where to go and somersaulted over Rodriguez's bike. Both riders would have cuts on their eyelids and would need to be bandaged up by the medical support convertibles. Otherwise the riders were unscathed. Unfortunately the crash would affect Kuss as he could not keep pace with the peloton and lost 20 minutes on the stage to the yellow jersey and fell out of the top 10 in the GC standings. He has not had any luck seeing as last weekend he was caught up in the crash with the selfie-ing fan. Rodriguez would be paced back to the peloton by his team car, but would not be able to make any sizeable gain in the GC, yellow jersey standings.

 On the col de Grosse Pierre Thibaut Pinot who was in a countermove would bridge up to the leading six riders. Ciccone would be the first to crest the climb, and the remaining members of the counter-attack would catch on forming a large breakaway. The breakaway would never get more than a minute and a half lead on the peloton. At the top of the Col de la Schlucht, Ciccone took the maximum points and celebrated winning the polka dot jersey. Thibaut Pinot attacked the breakaway that was disintegrating on the Petit Ballon and rode into an extremely vocal crowd of his supporters at the top of the climb. He crested with a 30 second lead over the first chase group which contained Tom Pidcock and Warren Barguil. Pinot started the Col du Platerwasel all alone, but he would be caught mid way up the climb by the first chasing group. They would be caught by a group that surged from the peloton of Tadej Pogacar (UAE-Team Emirates) , Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma), and Felix Gall (Ag2r-Citroen).  The trio would crest the col together, but be joined by Simon and Adam Yates during the descent. Tadej Pogacar would win the sprint for the stage win contested by the lead group of five. Pinot managed to be in the second group on the descent, but would not make the junction with the lead group before the finish line. He would finish seventh on the stage in his swansong Tour de France. 

 

Tour de France 2023: Moirans-en-Montagne - Poligny

 

Tour de France 2023: Moutiers - Bourg-en-Bresse

 Kasper Asgreen would finally have the stage winning success that had so far eluded Soudal-Quickstep in a breakaway on a flat stage. We were reminded that the breakaway can still win on a flat stage, and upset the formula of how flat stages typically go down. The sprinters missed out on an opportunity for likely their last stage win before Paris.

Route Description: The 18th stage was from Moutiers to Bourg-en-Bresse over 184.9 km. The stage started in the valley at the foot of the Col de la Loze climb used the previous day. The course then snaked its way along the valley floor to leave the Alps behind.On the route were two category 4 climbs followed by the mid race sprint was located 132.9 km into the stage. The remainder of the stage was relatively flat and nearly perfect for a sprint finish.

Race Summary and Analysis:This stage started with 152 riders leaving Moutiers. Notably Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) did not start the stage. The early breakaway would be formed by Kasper Asgreen (Soudal-Quickstep), Victor Campaneaerts (Lotto-Dstny), and Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X). They would get a maximum lead of one minute 48 seconds, but for the majority of the stage their lead would be at around one mnute or less. The teams with sprinters still in the race set the pace in the peloton to be able to reel in the break. Jayco-AlUla, Alpecin-Deucinck, and DSM-Firmenich each had riders at the front of the peloton focused on managing the break. With 65km to go the break had only about a 24 second gap when Pascal Eenkhorm (Lotto-Dstny) attacked from the peloton. Campanaerts would drop back to his teammate and they would work together to regroup with Asgreen and Abrahamsen. The break would have a 40 second with 20 km to go and a 20 second lead with 10km left in the stage. The sprint teams usually want to capture the breakaway between 20 and 10 km to go. The ideal situation for these teams is to capture the breakaway closer to 10 km so that way they don't have to worry as much about counterattacks. The later the catch is made in a stage, particularly inside 10 km, reduces the amount of time that the sprinters can line up their lead out trains. The chaos involved with the breakaway being caught in the final 3 kilometers sometimes results in unexpected stage winners. The breakaway had a lead of less than 10 seconds with 3 km to go. The usual rule of thumb is that a breakaway should lose one minute per kilometer to the peloton in the final 10 km of a flat stage. The breakaway at this point should have been still cuaght seeing as the peoloton could probably visually see the four leaders. The peloton would miss out on making the catch of the breakaway as they finally caught the tail end of the leading quartet at the finish line. Instead the breakaway riders would contest the stage win and Kasper Asgreen would finally break the drought for Soudal-Quickstep. This team had no luck with Fabio Jakobsen before he abandoned, and had sent Asgreen and Alaphilliippe in multiple day long breakaways to come up empty handed. Jasper Phillipsen (Alpecin-Deucinck), wearer of the green jersey, would finish fourth.

 

Tour de France 2023: Saint Gervais Mont Blanc - Courchevel

 The stage after the time trial in the high Alps with the highest altitude pass as part of the finale of the stage was meant to have drama. The drama definitely showed up with Felix Gall winning from the breakaway with a master class of climbing strength over the Col de la Loze. The yellow jersey competition would be driven wide open with Tadej Pogacar's inability to keep pace with the yellow jersey over the last climb.

Route Description: The 17th stage was from Saint Gervais Mont Blanc to Courchevel over 165.7 km. The stage starts with the Category 1 climb, Col des Saisies, starting 17.1 km into the stage and cresting 13.4 km further down the road. The descent of the Col des Saisies is followed by the mid-stage sprint at Beaufort. Almost immediately after the sprint is the start of the climb of the Category 1 climb of the Cormet de Roseland which is 19.4km in length. A long descent from the top of the col preceded the Category 2 Cote de Longefoy which was only 6.6km long. A very technical descent would lead the race to the foot of the Col de la Loze, an HC category climb, with a length of 28.1 km. The climb also had bonus seconds at the top. The descent of the Col de la Loze to Courchevel was down a bicycle path. The finish line for Courchevel was setup at the top of the runaway which meant a super steep final 500 meters of the stage.

Race Summary and Analysis: A large breakaway would form including Alexis Renard (Cofidis). French champion Valentin Madouas (Groupama-FDJ) and Magnus Cort (EF Education-EasyPost), Rafal Majka (UAE Team Emirates), Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ), Neilson Powless, Rigoberto Uran (EF Education-EasyPost), Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-Quick Step), Jack Haig (Bahrain Victorious), Giulio Ciccone, Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek), Felix Gall (AG2R-Citroën), Rui Costa (Intermarché-Circus-Wanty), Victor Lafay (Cofidis), Kevin Vermaerke (DSM-Firmenich), Krists Neilands (Israel-Premier Tech), Simon Yates, Lawson Craddock, Chris Harper (Jayco-AlUla), Clément Champoussin (Arkea-Samsic), Jonas Gregaard (Uno-X) formed 20km into the stage. Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) would crash inadvertently 15 km into the stage on an uphill section of the stage. He would ride on unscathed. Giulio Ciccone would be the first to crest both the Col du Saisies, Cormet de Roseland, and Cote de Longefoy to solidify his lead on the King of the Mountain jersey. The breakaway would be reduced to 15 riders at the start of the Col de la Loze.. The breakaway was being driven by the three riders of Ag2r-Citroen. Pello Bilbao (Bahrain-Victorious), Simon Yates (Jayco-AlUla) and Felix Gall (Ag2r-Citroen) had the most to gain from being in the break as they could climb higher in the general classification. As the race hit the steep part of the climb, the bicycle path to the top of the climb, Felix Gall attacked the reduced break to win the stage. He would survive the extreme slopes of this climb and win. Meanwhile in the yellow jersey group Jumbo-Visma set a solid pace as the climb started. Their efforts would bear fruit as Tadej Pogacar would be distanced 13 km from the top. Once Jumbo-Visma noticed the gap had opened Sepp Kuss went to the lead of the group  and set a blistering pace to increase the gap. Eventually Jonas Vingegaard would attack in the upper sections of the climb and started to reduce the gap to the lone leader Felix Gall. He would be briefly held up by a stalled sedan containing race organizers and/or referees. The delay may have affected Vingegaard's ability to win the stage, but it probably had little impact on his time gain over Pogacar. Vingegaard would end up finishing one minute 52 seconds behind the stage winner with Pello Bilbao and David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ) riding with him into the final 500 meter incline. Tadej Pogacar would finish seven minutes and 37 seconds behind the stage winner and is now seven minutes 35 seconds behind Vingegaard in the race for the yellow jersey. It seems quite evident that Vingegaard had a plan to attack today on the hardest stage in the mountains in this year's Tour de France. The Tour is not over as there are three stages left before the ceremonial stage on the Champs Elysee, and Saturday is another serious climbing stage with an uphill finish.

Tour de France 2023: Passy - Combloux

 

Route Description: The 16th stage was an individual time trial from Passy to Combloux over 22.4 km. In the individual time trial every rider will depart in reverse order of the general classification standing, the overall standings or the competition for the yellow jersey, and ride the entire route on their own. This means that the final rider out of the start is the yellow jersey. If they pass another or get passed this must be done with separation so as to avoid drafting off the rider being passed. The route left Passy and climbed the Cote de la Cascade de Coeur before passing the first time check at Passy Chef-Lieu 7.1 km into the stage. This was followed by a descent into the town of Sallanches which hosted the 1989 World Championships won by the '89 Tour de France champion American Greg Lemond. A relatively flat section of road existed between Sallanches and Domancy, where the second time check existed at 16.1 km, followed by the climb of the Category 2 Cote de Domancy. At the top of the Cote de Domancy was the third and final time check. From the final time check were 3.5 km of further climbing to the finish line at Combloux.

Race Summary and Analysis: I won't bore you with all the changes in the lead over the day. I will instead focus on the major lead changes and the yellow jersey competition. I should state that American Matteo Jorgenson (Movistar) did not start the stage after the rest day. Remi Cavagna (Soudal-Quickstep), the French national time trial champion, would set the time at the finish line that would hold for over two hours as other riders could not match his pace. Eventually Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) would set a faster time while wearing the Belgian national time trial champion jersey. His time would hold until the final two riders crossed the line. A succession of riders in the top 10 would fail to beat Van Aert's time as they all rode up to the finish line in Combloux. 

Tadej Pogacar (UAE-Emirates) wearing the white jersey left the starting blocks before Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) sepearated by a mere 10 seconds. Both riders started out going at very fast paces. Pogacar would set the fastest time at the first time check only to have Vingegaard surpass his time by 16 seconds. At the second time check Vingegaard's lead would be 30 seconds. Over the first two thirds of the course Vingegaard had been going faster than Pogacar, and both of them were clearly the class of the field.

The key question of the day was whether to switch to the road bike from the time trial bike for the climb. Time trial bicycles are heavier than the bicycles used on mountain stages, but they are more aerodynamic. The risk of doing a bicycle change is the amount of time lost and getting a quick and efficient exchange of bicycles. Tadej Pogacar would change his bicycle at the foot of the Cote de Domancy costing him 10 seconds. Since at that point he was already approaching 30 seconds down at that moment his time loss immediately went up to 40 seconds. In contrast Vingegaard decided not to switch bicycles. He would then continue to decrease the distance between he and Pogacar while increasing his time gap advantage all the way to the finish line. Pogacar would set a new fastest time at the finish, and beat Van Aert by one minute and thirteen seconds. Unfortunately Vingegaard was following not far behind looking to set a new fastest time for the day and win the stage. At the finish line Vingegaard had beaten Pogacar by one minute thirty eight seconds and expanded his lead in the yellow jersey to one minute forty eight seconds. The tour is not yet finished as there are still at least two opportunities for Pogacar to reverse his deficit,  but the way the two have been riding neck and neck leads me to think this will be extremely difficult. The most likely chances will Stage 17 and Stage 19 which are a major alpine stage and an uphill finish respectively. One question that can be asked is whether Vingegaard may have put too much effort into today's stage and may suffer a significant loss on the next stage, but a short time trial like today more than likely is not a sizeable enough effort to leave Vingegaard out of energy. We should be in for some great racing for the rest of the race.

Tour de France 2023: Les Gets Portes du Soleil - Saint Gervais-Mont Blanc

 

Route Description: The thirteenth stage was from Les Gets Portes du Soleil to Morzine Les Portes du Soleil over 151.8 km. This stage started with 7 km of descent that would be neutralized by the race to avoid crashes due to the extreme speeds that would occur. This was followed by 20km of descending and flat roads. Next there would be an uncategorized climb which would lead to the mid-stage sprint point before a quick descent to the first category 1 climb, Col du Forclaz de Montrim. From the top of the Col de Forclaz to the next category 1 climb, the Col de la Croix Fry. This is almost immediately followed by the Category 3 climb of the Col des Aravis. A long descent down into the valley followed the Col des Aravis. Once in the valley there were a couple of kilometers of flat roads that led to the Category 2 Cote des Amerands. Immediately following the descent of the category 2 climb was the start of the climb to the finish line at Saint Gervais-Mont Blanc, which is rated a Category 1 climb.

Race Summary and Analysis: This stage started with a long section of neutralized start descending into the valley from Les Gets. Once the stage started there was a frantic pace of attacks and counterattacks that made for another quick start.  At one point all the agressive riding at the front of the peloton created a split that had Pello Bilbao (Bahrain-Victorious) in the group behind the yellow jersey. His team would chase down the main peloton and a big regrouping would occur. Eventually an eight man break containing Neilson Powless (EF Education - EasyPost) would form, but it would never get more than a 12 second lead. This breakaway attempt was chased by Lidl-Trek and Cofidis who had no interest in letting this move go. Nils Politt (Bora-Hansgrohe) attack and rode away solo 29km into the stage. As the uncategorized climb began Julian Alaphillippe (Soudal-Quickstep) attacked and was joined by Alexey Lutsenko (Astana) who caught Politt. A 27 rider group would form that was chasing Alaphillippe and Lutsenko.  This group would grow to a group of 37 containing  Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma), Marc Soler (UAE Team Emirates), Omar Fraile (Ineos Grenadiers), Olivier Le Gac, Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ), Andrey Amador, Magnus Cort, Powless, Rigoberto Uran (EF Education-EasyPost), Mikel Landa, Wout Poels (Bahrain Victorious), Marco Haller, Patrik Konrad, Nils Politt (Bora-Hansgrohe), Giulio Ciccone, Mathias Skjelmose, Juan Pedro Lopez (Lidl-Trek), Nans Peters (Ag2r-Citröen), Van der Poel, Soren Kragh Andersen (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Rui Costa (Intermarché-Circus-Wanty), Guillaume Martin, Ion Izagirre (Cofidis), Alex Aranburu (Movistar), Chris Hamilton (DSM-Firmenich), Michael Woods, Hugo Houle, Krists Neilands, Dylan Teuns (Israel-PremierTech), Lawson Craddock, Luka Mezgec, Chris Juul-Jensen (Jayco-AlUla), Warren Barguil, Simon Guglielmi (Arkéa-Samsic), Tobias Halland Johannessen, Torstein Traeen (Uno-X) and Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies). All the breaks were being kept on a short leash and were only able to gain a lead of 20 seconds. In the peloton a fan trying to take a selfie or picture with their phone hit Sepp Kuss (Jumbo-Visma) on the handlebars causing a massive pileup at the front of the peloton. Pogacar and Vingegaard managed to avoid getting caught up in the crash, but were held up getting their bicycles free from the mess. The peloton at that moment decided to neutralize the race itself and wait for all the rides to catch back up. The peloton essentially formed a line all the way across the road and rode at a slow pace. This is called the barrage and is often done after a chaotic crash in the peloton. The barrage allowed the break to get an eight minute lead over the peloton.After all the riders had caught back up from the crash which didn't result in any riders abandoning the stage, the peloton started to set a pace that slowly started to reverse the time gap. UAE and Jumbo-Visma didn't need to worry about any riders in the break taking the yellow jersey since most of them were very far from the top of the general classification. At the top of the first climb of the day Alaphillippe and Lutsenko would crest the climb in the lead, and Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek) beat Neilson Powless for the remaining points on hand. Lutsenko and Alaphillippe would be caught by the 37 rider chase group between the first and second climb. On the second climb of the day the lead group would start to disintegrate with riders being tailed off. Powless would be dropped and not score any additional king of the mountains points. Giulio Ciccone would take the maximum points on this climb and go into a tie with Powless on points. On the ascent of the third climb the first Rui Costa (Intermarche-Wanty-Circus) and then Marc Soler (UAE Emirates) would attack the break fearing the pace was too slow compared to the peloton. Wout Van Aert would attack over the top of the climb and would be joined in the descent of the third climb by Wout Poels (Bahrain-Victorious) and Kris Neilands (Israel- Premiere Tech) after having caught Marc Soler. The quartet of riders would ride down the descent to the foot of the final two climbs until Neilands crashed in the descent trying to get a water bottle from the neutral bottle motorcycle. He would be ok to continue on, but be caught by the peloton. On the second category climb Wout Poels would drop his break partners and go for a solo victory. Wout Van Aert would chase him but would continue to lose time on the ascent to the finish line. In the peloton the GC favorites were gunning for a fight on the final climb. UAE set a pace that dropped all but Pogacar, Adam Yates, and Vingegaard. At one point Yates pulled away from Pogacar and Vingegaard. Pogacar looked like he was on his limit and that Vingegaard should attack, but he would not. In the end he may not have had any ability to attack, but this was smart tactically since Pogacar had two teammates up the road. Either way Pogacar did attack in the last 500 meters, and Vingegaard would follow the attack and even nearly pass him on the way to the line. Pogacar would cross ahead of Vingegaard, but no time difference or time bonus would be assessed. to either of them. Thus going into the second rest day Vingegaard maintains a 10 second lead on Pogacar.

Tour de France 2023: Annemasse - Morzine Les Portes du soleil

 The first showdown in the Alps didn't dissapoint. The steep climbs combined with the time bonus available at the top of the last climb meant that the stage turned into a significant battle for the yellow jersey with no real change to the yellow jersey standings.

Route Description: The thirteenth stage was from AnneMasse to Morzine Les Portes du Soleil over 151.8 km. This stage contained three category 1 climbs, a third category climb, and the final climb was rated Hors Categorie, beyond categorization. The stage started with the category 3 climb followed by two category 1 climbs before the mid-stage sprint location at the Col de Jambaz. After the sprint was the descent into the last category 1 climb. The last climb of the day was the HC rated Col de Joux Plane which included a time bonus at the top. From the top of the Col du Joux Plane there was 12 km of technical descent to the finish line at Morzine.

Race Summary and Analysis: The stage started with 165 riders remaining in the Tour de France. 6.5 km into the stage there was a massive crash that caused the Tour to have to halt. Louis Mentjes (Intermarche-Circus-Wanty) and Antonio Pederero (Movistar) would abandon as a result of the crash. The race was restarted approximately half an hour later, but Esteban Chaves (EF Education- EasyPost) would abandon in pain from his crash injuries 15 km into the stage. The first breakaway of the day would form with Lars van den Berg (Groupama-FDJ), Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-Quick Step), and Krists Neilands (Israel-Premier Tech). Dani Martinez (Ineos Grenadiers) and Alexey Lutsenko (Astana) would join the lead trio later. On the descent of the third category climb James Shaw (EF Education - EasyPost) and Romain Bardet (DSM-Firmenich) would crash and have to abandon. This is only the second time that Romain Bardet has abandoned the Tour, and as a good descender this is a very unlikely way for him to have to leave the Tour. The attacks and counter attacks occurred between the category 3 and the first category 1 climb. Eventually a 21 rider breakaway would form. The peloton led by Jumbo-Visma kept the break from gaining too much time with a solid pace. The breakaway didn't contain any immediate risks to the yellow jersey placing of either Pogacar or Vingegaard and thus these teams didn't see a need to chase. Jumbo-Visma must have had plans to attack Pogacar in the later parts of the stage since they kept the break from getting a large lead that would be insurmountable even with all the tough climbing on par for the stage. Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek) would take the maximum king of the mountain points on the first two Category 1 climbs ahead of Polka Dot jersey wearer Neilson Powless (EF Education - EasyPost). On the second Category 1 climb Ciccone got a gap and started the descent solo. He would be caught by a group containing Mikel Landa (Bahrain Victorious), Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ), Alex Anaburu (Movistar), Wout Poels (Bahrain-Victorious), and Michael Woods (Israel-Premiere Tech). Woods and Ciccone would ride away from their breakaway counterparts at the start of the third Category 1 climb, but would be caught before the top by the yellow jersey group. Wout Van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) would be the first rider over the last Category 1 climb. With the breakaway reeled in Jumbo-Visma was in the clear to start their planned moves to drop Pogacar and help Jonas Vingegaard gain time.

With 30 km to go a group of 16 riders formed at the front containing Van Aert, Sepp Kuss, Wilco Kelderman, Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma), Felix Grossschartner, Rafal Majka, Adam Yates, Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates), Jai Hindley (Bora-Hansgrohe), Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos Grenadiers), Pello Bilbao (Bahrain Victorious), David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ), Simon Yates, Chris Harper (Jayco-AlUla), Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) and Felix Gall (Ag2r-Citröen). Jumbo Visma would lead the group up the hors categorie (HC) climb of the col du Joux Plane. At 5km from the top Jai Hindley would be dropped by the pace set by Sepp Kuss. Pogacar decided to attack at 3.7 km from the top and gained a 4 second lead. Vingegaard would spend the next two kilometers catching back up to Pogacar. Pogacar while a very talented climber has a very strong explosive sprint that he can use uphill and on the flats also. This explosive burst has allowed him to get separation from Vingegaard several times, but his pace slows down after the initial burst. Vingegaard will often follow the immediate attack, but back off rather quickly to not burn out and lose a larger amount of time. Instead he will maintain a very high tempo which is often faster than Pogacar after his explosive attack. Once Vingegaard caught Pogacar they were left to mark each other one on one without any other riders. With approximately 1 km to go to the top Pogacar attacked again, but had to stop due to nearly running into the motorcycles in front of them. This allowed Vingegaard to catch back up. TV commentators were riled by the fact that the motorcycles were so close to the riders at that point, but the crowd on the top of the climb had narrowed the road to barely one riders width. The motorcycles are unable to get more distance without losing the riders to the crowd, and they are going at barely a stable speed due to having to force the fans to move out of the way. It should be pointed out that I did not see a single officer towards the top assigned for crowd control. I do not blame the motorcycles for the predicament they were in, and the riders should be appreciative of the space created by them otherwise they might have crashed from a fans arm, flag, or article of clothing hooking their handlebars. At the top Vingegaard pulled a Pogacar and attacked for the time bonus at the top of the Col de Joux Plane. They would go thru the false plateau that exists after the crest of the climb with Carlos Rodriguez being the third rider over the top. Rodriguez would chase down the lead duo at the top of the technical descent and then pass them. He would make the descent all the way to the finish line solo. Pogacar and Vingegaard would trail him by several seconds chasing the time bonuses at the finish line. With about 2km left in the stage Adam Yates of UAE would catch up with Pogacar and Vingegaard. The next man behind the trio was Sepp Kuss a teammate of Vingegaard, but the stage would finish with no change to the yellow jersey holder, but the time gap would increase by one second.