Tadej Pogačar put a definitive stamp on his dominant 2024 Tour de France with a solo victory atop Isola 2000 on one of the hardest days in the race. The UAE Team Emirates rider, who has worn yellow since stage 4, surged out of an elite group of favorites on the final climb and quickly swept up the remnants of the day's breakaway to take a solo victory and further pad his margin in the general classification.
Visma-Lease a Bike's Matteo Jorgenson, the last survivor of that break, finished second, 21 seconds behind. It's the second year in a row for the American rider to be denied a stage win late on a summit finish. Behind, his teammate Jonas Vingegaard and Soudal-Quick Step's Remco Evenepoel did their best to limit the damage but conceded a further 1:42 in the overall standings as they crossed in fifth and sixth place on the day behind two other survivors of the breakaway.
[race_result id=17 stage_id=79155 count=10 gc=0 year=2024] [race_result id=17 stage_id=79155 count=10 gc=10 year=2024]How it happened
- With two of the hardest stages in the race on tap Friday and Saturday, teams that hadn't yet won a stage were active in trying to get in a breakaway in hopes of getting enough time to hold off the inevitable GC battles behind. But in addition to the usual suspects Visma, with second placed-overall and stage 11 winner Vingegaard, was also aggressive, getting both Jorgenson and Wilco Kelderman into the day's main break, which eventually settled at nine riders.
- Behind, UAE rode a watchful tempo on the front, not overly concerned with the presence of two Visma domestiques out front but clearly alert to any Visma plans for a long-range assault.
- Ultimately, that never came; on the climb over the race's highest point, the 2,798-meter Cime de la Bonette, the yellow jersey group dwindled to fewer than 15 riders, and while Pogačar had ample company from his team, Vingegaard was isolated.
- On the final climb to Isola 2000, the breakaway started to distintegrate and it was Jorgenson who struck the decisive blow, going clear with 10 km to race. Stage 17 winner Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) tried to follow, as did Jayco-AlUla's Simon Yates, but the Visma rider was simply too strong.
- Ultimately, he was undone only by Pogačar himself, who surged out of the favorites group with roughly 9 km to go. Evenepoel and Vingegaard tried only briefly to match his pace before settling in to a resigned chase led by Evenepoel's teammate, Mikel Landa.
- Pogačar swept through the remnants of the break, putting a minute into Vingegaard and Evenepoel in just 3 km, and passed Jorgenson with a little less than 2 km to go to solo to the win, his fourth stage victory of this Tour.
I can confirm Bonette is really scary. We were here training for a whole month between [the] Giro and Tour. And I knew this climb super well. We were speaking already in training camp, how we want to race this day. And we did it exactly like we said, to the point where I attacked.
Pogačar on a day that went exactly to plan
Brief analysis
- Pogačar said earlier this week that he fully expected Visma to race aggressively in the final Alpine stages; it wasn't a question of whether Vingegaard would attack, but when. That will likely not play out. Today's tactic from the team was originally with Vingegaard in mind, said DS Grischa Niermann, but he also told Eurosport after the stage that Vingegaard came on race radio on the Cime de la Bonette to say he didn't have the legs. It's hard to imagine that changes tomorrow, with the Dane now 5:03 down.
- Vingegaard appears to be showing the limits of what's possible from his injury-shortened preparation from the Tour. Just a week ago he was nicking Pogačar at the line on stage 11 after a gritty chase back, and raising expectations and hopes of challenging the Slovenian in the final week. Instead, his form has been slowly eroding, to the point that he let Evenepoel do most of the pacemaking today.
- For his part, Evenepoel may be targeting second. Pogačar's move wasn't so much an attack as a lifting of the pace, and once it was clear Evenepoel seemed more interested in trying to shed Vingegaard than necessarily getting back up to the race leader. That sets up an interesting final two days; Evenepoel is 1:58 down to Vingegaard. Jumping over him for second would probably require a collapse on the part of the Dane, but it's not impossible.
- Pogačar, meanwhile, had the support of what is clearly the deepest and most powerful team in the race. Nils Politt smashed the stage with a massive pull on the Bonette, and even as the yellow jersey group whittled down to fewer than 15 riders, Pogačar's teammates Adam Yates and João Almeida were always by his side until the final decisive acceleration.
- Is the yellow jersey finally sated? It seems like it from his post-stage interview. "Tomorrow, I must say that I can just enjoy the stage," he said, comfortable with his five minute advantage to Vingegaard. "We let the breakaway go, and maybe we enjoy the roads where we were training [the] month before the Tour, and where I train all my career, almost. And, yeah, let's go and enjoy tomorrow and hope nothing serious happens." You're on notice, climbers.
Up next
One last mass-start stage awaits with a 132.8 km ride from Nice to the summit finish on the Col de la Couillole. With four major climbs and more than 4,700 meters of elevation gain, it will be a huge target for any good climbers on teams that have not yet won a stage. And so close to Nice, it's also "home roads" for riders like Pogačar who live in nearby Monaco (or in Jorgenson's case, Nice). Expect a big, early move and a knock-down fight in the break for the stage win.
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