Jasper Philipsen sprints to Tour de France stage 1 win and first yellow jersey

Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) powered to victory on a chaotic and windy opening stage of the 2025 Tour de France in Lille to take the first yellow jersey of the race. 

Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty) ended second and Søren Wærenskjold (Uno-X Mobility) in third in a sprint finish from a reduced group that was formed when the race split into echelons in the final 20km. Alpecin-Deceuninck delivered a masterful leadout for Philipsen through Mathieu van der Poel and Kaden Groves, and the Belgian executed the perfect sprint to take his tenth Tour de France stage win.

Threats of echelons led to nerves across the peloton, and this led the pace to remain high throughout the majority of the stage. With 17km remaining, the race split into pieces, thanks in large part to the work of Jonas Vingegaard and Visma | Lease a Bike.

Vingegaard and Pogačar were the two big GC winners on the day and put plenty of work into keeping the gap at the front, as the likes of Remco Evenepoel and Primož Roglič were caught out and would end up 39 seconds behind at the finish line. Two of the big favourites for the stage, Tim Merlier and Jonathan Milan, also missed the front split. 

The Grand Départ of the 112th Tour de France took place on home soil for the first time since 2021, beginning in the city of Lille. Although the stage was expected to be one for the sprinters, the threat of potential echelons added an extra element of spice and nerves to the day.

As soon as the flag dropped, five riders launched themselves from the peloton without hesitation to try and form the day’s breakaway. 

Bruno Armirail (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale), Mattis Le Berre (Arkéa-B&B Hotels), Jonas Rutsch (Intermarché-Wanty), Benjamin Thomas (Cofidis) and Matteo Vercher (TotalEnergies) opened an early lead, but it never reached much more than 2:30 as Lidl-Trek and Alpecin-Deceuninck gave chase.

Thomas led over the first climb, the Côte-de-Notre-Dame-de-Lorette, but the gap was beginning to shrink.

The first significant crash of the Tour occurred with 132km remaining when Filippo Ganna (Ineos) and Sean Flynn (Picnic PostNL) hit the ground after colliding as the peloton squeezed on the approach to a central reservation. Ganna remounted and gave chase, but he would abandon the race due to his injuries with 70km remaining.

Not long afterwards, Stefan Bissegger (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) came down and looked the worse for wear. Like Ganna, Bissegger would eventually succumb to the effects of his crash and would become the second rider to abandon the race.

With the speed in the peloton at this time, it was understandable that a few riders had suffered crashes as the pace was flat out, as teams were fighting for position to keep their leaders safe ahead of a section of the route that was potentially exposed to the wind with around 120km remaining.

With around 110 kilometres to go, the first small splits began to occur in the peloton with the likes of Lenny Martinez (Bahrain-Victorious) and Luke Plapp (Jayco AlUla) briefly distanced, and the increase in speed saw the break caught soon afterwards.

Jonathan Milan comfortably won the intermediate sprint ahead of Bryan Coquard (Cofidis), Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty), and Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck), and fortunately for those caught out, the pace briefly calmed enough after the intermediate sprint for them to return to the peloton.

Vercher, not content to be caught so early, attacked immediately after the intermediate sprint and was shortly joined by one of his earlier companions, Thomas. The duo would eventually be involved in one of the biggest talking points of the stage on the Mont Cassel climb, where the duo both hit the ground over the summit when Thomas's wheel slid out on the cobbles. No matter, Thomas did enough to take the polka dot jersey.

Over the final categorised climb, the Mont Noir, it was Jonas Vingegaard who surprisingly took the single point, to open his account in the mountains classification.

It was a sign of things to come. With around 20km remaining, Visma | Lease a Bike began to put pressure on, and with 17km to go, Vingegaard hit the front himself alongside his teammate Edoardo Affini, and big splits began to occur. Crucially, Tadej Pogačar, Mathieu van der Poel, Jasper Philpsen and Biniam Girmay were some of the riders who made the correct side of the split, while Remco Evenepoel, Primož Roglič, Jonathan Milan and Tim Merlier were caught out in the second group.

With just under 10km to go, Van der Poel briefly surged clear from the front group alongside his teammate Kaden Groves, but they eased up.

There was a crash in the front group with 4km remaining, which took out Marijn van den Berg (EF Education-EasyPost) and Ben O’Connor (Jayco AlUla). Both picked themselves up and there was no damage to O’Connor’s GC ambitions as the safety zone was extended to 5 kilometres for this opening stage.

Under the flamme rouge and Alpecin-Deceuninck took control with their supreme lead-out train that featured Xandro Meurisse, Jonas Rickaert, Mathieu van der Poel and then Kaden Groves as the final lead-out for Philipsen.

Pascal Ackermann (Israel-Premier Tech) launched his sprint on the left-hand side of the road with around 450 metres remaining, trying to catch the others by surprise.

However, Philipsen proved to be supreme, powering to the victory, lengths ahead of Girmay in second and Wærenskjold in third. Pogačar and Vingegaard finished safely in the front group while Milan led the second group home 39 seconds behind, which featured both Roglič and Evenepoel.

"Yeah, it's really amazing, this tenth victory is something I'll never forget," Philipsen said after crossing the line. "Just this team performance was incredible, we were there all day, all day was very nervous because we knew that today had to be our day and that we had to be in the front, and we were there in the split, and the team did amazing."

"Suddenly, in the final 15 kilometres, it all opened up, and the team was incredibly strong, I think everybody's on a really good level," Philipsen explained. The electric atmosphere in Lille provided additional motivation for the Belgian in the crucial moments of the race.

"I knew I had really good legs, and the final two kilometres with all the spectators, all the people next to the fences, it gave me goosebumps, and I knew we just had to do it and my legs got some extra strength from the adrenaline, riding through Lille - it was just an incredible feeling," he said.

For Philipsen, wearing the leader's jersey represents a career milestone that he plans to treasure. "I cannot have dreamed about it. I already had the green jersey from two years ago, and then to have the yellow jersey hanging somewhere in my house in the next years is going to be amazing," he added.