'Hectic day' - Pogacar and Vingegaard strike blow on Tour de France stage 1

The two big contenders for the yellow jersey took an early step in the right direction during a chaotic and windy opening stage of the Tour de France in Lille, which was won by Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck). Both Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Jonas Vingegaard (Visma | Lease a Bike) were on the right end of a major split in the peloton with 17km remaining. 

In fact, the split can largely be credited to the work of Jonas Vingegaard and his Visma | Lease a Bike team, who pre-empted the danger by moving to the front with 20km remaining, before the high pace combined with the wind caused the split to materialise.

"It was a stressful day, and it was a good day for us. We end up in the first group. It was our plan to try and go in the wind with 20km  to go, so the team did super well, they kept me out of trouble at any point today," Vingegaard said to reporters after crossing the line in Lille.

Vingegaard explained how the team had identified the key sections on the stage where crosswinds would likely hit the peloton and pre-empted the danger that others may cause by moving to the front. 

"To be honest, it’s either us or somebody else trying. At that moment, we knew it [the wind] would come straight from the side and we knew there was enough wind, so at that point, you know that either you go or someone else is going," Vingegaard said. "At that point, you might [as well] be doing that yourself, then you know you are on the front at least. So that was our approach today, and we succeeded in that.”

Vingegaard's thoughts were echoed by Visma's sports director Frans Maassen who explained the importance of being proactive rather than reactive on a windy stage in Northern France. 

"We had to invest to do that. It was a hard day for all the peloton. You saw big gaps at the end, it was a good day for us," Maassen said. "We can only see what it means afterwards, but for us it was important that we didn’t crash and came safe to the finish with Jonas. With such a small group, it was a good day for us."

Despite a largely positive day for Vingegaard and Visma | Lease a Bike, Simon Yates lost 6:31 on the stage, ending the possibility of keeping the recent Giro d'Italia winner as another card to play in the GC in case something happened to the Dane. Vingegaard acknowledged this and also the fact that things could have been worse, potentially, if the race hadn't split before the finish.

“Yeah sure, it’s not nice that Simon [Yates] lost about I think six minutes, so yeah that was a bit of a bump on the road to be honest," Vingegaard said. 

"But, on the other hand, we also kept ourselves safe, and to be honest, I think that it was the most safe of a final that it could have been. I think going there in the finish of stage 1 of the Tour de France with 180 riders would have been chaos.”

In the UAE Team Emirates-XRG camp, Tadej Pogačar was always where he needed to be, but was less protected than Vingegaard in the final kilometres, with only one teammate, Tim Wellens, making the front split, but the world champion credited his team for their performance throughout the stage.

"It was a hectic day, just as we thought. In the end, me and Tim [Wellens], we were in front thanks to a good job from all the team," Pogačar said. "From kilometre zero we were in the front and it paid off for us in the end. I'm just happy day one is done and we can move on."

"It's the start of a big week - nine days to go to the rest day, and then we go from then on. But first, we focus on these nine days," Pogačar added.

In the end, Pogačar and Vingegaard were the two big winners in the general classification in the front group finishing 39 seconds ahead of chasers which included both Evenepoel and Roglič.