LES ANGLES, France — Tadej Pogacar made the most of the first mountain stage of the Tour de France to post his 22nd career stage win at cycling's biggest race and seize the race leader's yellow jersey on Monday.
Pogacar, the overwhelming favourite, sprinted away from his rivals in the final climb to Les Angles in the French Pyrenees, about 200 metres from the finish line, and no one could match his speed.
The UAE Emirates-XRG leader held his arms out in triumph and clenched his fists at the summit as he crossed with a two-second lead over Jonas Vingegaard, Richard Carapaz and Paul Seixas.
Pogacar took 10 bonus seconds for his win, and Vingegaard was awarded a six-second bonus for his second place. Overall, Pogacar and Vingegaard are level on time but Pogacar’s stage win coupled with his second place in Sunday's Stage 2 earned him the yellow jersey.
The two-time world champion has crushed his rivals this season and chases a record-equaling fifth Tour victory. The only four riders to have won five Tours are Belgian Eddy Merckx, Spaniard Miguel Indurain and Frenchmen Jacques Anquetil and Bernard Hinault.
Monday's win marked his 14th victory this season, a run that includes general classifications wins at the Tour de Suisse and the Tour de Romandie, as well as one-day triumphs at Liege-Bastogne-Liege, the Tour of Flanders, Milan San Remo and Strade Bianche.
Vingegaard, of Visma-Lease a Bike team, is looking to win the Tour for the third time after triumphing in 2022 and ’23. The Danish rider had taken the yellow jersey on Saturday after leading his Visma-Lease a Bike team to victory in the opening-day time trial around Barcelona.
The three-week race hit the mountains early on Monday’s 196-kilometre third stage, starting from Granollers in Spain and concluding with a short but sharp uphill dart to Les Angles in the French Pyrenees, about 60 kilometres from a large wildfire that has burned large swathes of land.
As a result, organizers decided that once the peloton reached France for the last 40 kilometres, the publicity caravan — a 10-kilometre-long procession of sponsor vehicles that precedes the race — would not operate. Only riders and vehicles essential to the race were allowed on the route, and spectators had been asked not to gather on the roadside or at the finish area.
Once in France, the number of fans along the roads — usually present in their thousands — decreased. But there were there actually quite a lot of spectators when the riders passed through villages further down the road.
