Never in doubt: Pogacar powers to fourth Tour stage win at Le Markstein

Tadej Pogačar was relatively isolated on the climb of the Col du Haag and Jonas Vingegaard put in his most aggressive display of the Tour de France so far, but it was all to no avail. The Slovenian attacked forcefully 1.5km from the top of the ascent and he proceeded to cruise clear of his rivals on the 6km plateau that followed to win stage 14 at Le Markstein.

The steep upper portion of the Col du Haag appeared to reveal some truths about this Tour. Pogačar remains in a league of his own, Vingegaard is still his closest rival and Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) is growing into his debut Tour, as he bridged up the Dane at the summit.

Vingegaard put up his usual, diligent resistance, and he battled to limit his losses to Pogačar on the steepest portion of the climb. By the summit, however, he was almost half a minute down. He was joined by Seixas and Pogačar’s teammate Isaac del Toro for the 6km run to the finish, but the yellow jersey continued to pile on the pressure, moving further and further out of sight.

At the finish, Pogačar had the 25th Tour stage win of his career and he had extended his hefty advantage at this year’s race. 

Del Toro won the sprint for second place at 38 seconds ahead of Seixas, while Vingegaard came across the line six seconds further back. Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) was distanced on the Haag but he recovered well over the summit and he joined his teammate Florian Lipowitz and Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek) in the finale to limit his losses to 48 seconds.

In the overall standings, Pogačar is now 4:30 clear of Vingegaard, while Evenepoel holds onto third, albeit now at 5:04.

Seixas, meanwhile, moves up to fourth overall and into the white jersey of best young rider after his strongest showing of the Tour to date. 

The peloton was waved away from the start in Mulhouse beneath driving rain, but the race was soon on dry roads as it thundered towards the first intermediate sprint, where Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Premier Tech) pipped green jersey Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) to the maximum points.

The category 1 Grand Ballon followed soon afterwards, and a flurry of attacks generated a split that saw a 37-strong group to forge clear. Remarkably, for the second successive day, Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) was among their number, while Visma Lease a Bike had Victor Campenaerts, Matteo Jorgenson and Bruno Armirail up the road representing Jonas Vingegaard’s interests. 

Approaching the top of the Grand Ballon, the escapees had 1:18 in hand on the UAE-led peloton, but the front group would split over the summit after forcing from EF Education-EasyPost.

Valentin Paret-Peintre (Soudal Quick-Step) led the EF duo of Ben Healy and Richard Carapaz and the Uno-X Mobility brothers Tobias Johannessen and Anders Johannessen over the top, and this quintet would stretch out their advantage on the descent.

Thymen Arensman (Netcompany-Ineos) formed a chasing group with Movistar’s Pablo Castrillo and Einer Rubio, while the sizeable Pidcock group began to lose some of its impetus. 

On the Col de Page, Rubio managed to bridge up to the five leaders, while Arensman suffered a costly puncture that forced him to keep chasing alone. Paret-Peintre led over the top, with Arensman at 40 seconds, the Pidcock group at 1:50 and the peloton at 3:10.

Another heavy downpour on the descent coincided with a brief split on the peloton, but the race was on dry roads once more for the following haul up the Ballon d’Alsace. The six riders in front continued to combine well, but their lead on the yellow jersey group was beginning to contract. 

Paret-Peintre led them over the top with 2:05 in hand on the peloton, which had caught the Pidcock group (and Arensman) towards the summit of the Ballon d’Alsace. With 60km to go, Pogačar still had five UAE teammates for company, and they would drive the pace in the valley leading towards the Col du Haag.

Out in front, Healy sacrificed himself on behalf of Carapaz, eventually swinging off on the unclassified climb with 33km to go, but the direction of travel was clear as the UAE-led yellow jersey group closed to within 1:35.

Anders Johannessen followed Healy in sacrificing himself on the approach to the foot of the 11km haul up the Col du Haag, where the break had 1:24 in hand on Pogačar et al. Once the climb began to bite, Carapaz’s strength began to tell, and he pressed on alone.

Behind, Brandon McNulty led the yellow jersey group onto the lower slopes, but Paul Seixas' Decathlon CMA CGM surprised by seizing the initiative, with first Tiesj Benoot and then Nicolas Prodhomme setting a rasping pace.

Their efforts quickly burnt off Pidcock as well as Pogačar’s teammates McNulty and Adam Yates, but the yellow jersey looked as comfortable as ever. 

When Prodhomme swung off, Vingegaard delegated his teammate Sepp Kuss to up the ante, clearly hoping to find some sign of weakness in the yellow jersey, but it was perhaps telling that Carapaz was stretching out his advantage at this point. 

The road steepened in the final 5km of the climb, prompting Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull) to launch a speculative attack, which Seixas pinned back. Almost immediately, Vingegaard stretched out the yellow jersey group with a long, seated acceleration that quickly sliced Carapaz’s lead to just 20 seconds. 

Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull) was distanced, but Pogačar, as ever, looked ominously comfortable on his wheel, while Seixas, Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek), Lipowitz and Isaac del Toro hung on.

They caught Carapaz and Tobias Johannessen a little under 2km from the summit. Shortly afterwards, Pogačar unleashed his much anticipated acceleration. Vingegaard, as ever, put up diligent resistance, but there is simply nothing to be done against this astonishing iteration of Pogačar.