Tour de France: Pogacar powers back into yellow at Mûr-de-Bretagne on stage 7

Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) won stage 7 of the Tour de France with a blistering sprint to move back into the yellow jersey at Mûr-de-Bretagne. Jonas Vingegaard (Visma | Lease a Bike) came home in second place in the same time as the Slovenian, while Oscar Onley (Picnic-PostNL) was third at two seconds.

Although Pogačar opened the attacking from the front group with 1.7km remaining, the final ascent of Mûr-de-Bretagne proved a surprisingly cagy affair. Only Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) and Vingegaard could follow that initial acceleration, but Pogačar did not persist. Instead Evenepoel controlled from the front on the steepest portion of the climb before a string of chasers regained contact beneath the flamme rouge.

Pogačar’s teammate Jhonatan Narváez led out the sprint and Pogačar duly proved the quickest, though he could only gain four seconds in time bonuses on a strong Vingegaard.

Evenepoel and Matteo Jorgenson (Visma | Lease a Bike) came home two seconds down, while overnight leader Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) was distanced at the foot of the climb.

The finale was marred by a crash that saw Joao Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) among the fallers. Although the Portuguese rider remounted and completed the stage, he lost more than 10 minutes and his hopes of a podium finish have faded. 

In the overall standings, Pogacar is 54 seconds ahead of Evenepoel, 1:11 up on Kevin Vauquelin and 1:17 ahead of Vingegaard.

For the second day in succession, there was rapid start to proceedings at the Tour de France, with a long running battle of attack and counter-attack before the break of the day finally took shape. Such is the attritional nature of this race in the Pogačar-Vingegaard era.

Once again, Visma | Lease a Bike made clear that they remain committed to their desire to wear down Pogačar’s resistance, sending Wout van Aert on the attack early on. The Belgian broke clear with Mauro Schmid (Jayco-Alula) after the flag dropped, but the move was never allowed to gain any purchase.

That didn’t stop Van Aert from trying again, and it was striking that Pogačar and Van der Poel were both to the fore in policing the early moves, mindful that this was the kind of day that could spiral out of control.

A move finally gained a foothold with 140km remaining, when 2018 Tour winner Geraint Thomas (Ineos) went clear with Alex Baudin (EF Education-EasyPost), Marco Haller (Tudor), Ewen Costiou (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) and Iván García Cortina (Movistar).

That quintet, however, was only give a very limited amount of leeway. Behind, an informal alliance between UAE Team Emirates-XRG and Alpecin-Deceuninck meant that Nils Politt and Silvan Dillier worked to ensure the break’s lead never yawned out much beyond 1:30.

By the time Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) led Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty) and the peloton through the intermediate sprint in Plédran with a shade over 50km remaining, the gap was down to a minute, and it was already apparent that Mûr-de-Bretagne would be the site of another dust-up between the GC contenders.

Visma began to take up real estate at the head of the bunch with 32km remaining as the tension ramped inexorably upwards. By the first passage up the climb of Mûr-de-Bretagne with 17kmto go, Haller had dropped out of the break, and Visma’s forcing began to whittle the gap down to size.

Out in front, Costiou attacked along from the break while Simon Yates piled on the pressure in the peloton with Vingegaard on his wheel. That pace split the field, with Van der Poel caught out on the steepest section of the climb before getting back on terms.

Costiou led through the finish line for the first time with 15km to go and 20 seconds in hand on a yellow jersey group of just 30 or so riders. The Frenchman was reeled in soon afterwards, and the speed rocketed upwards as Pogačar et al hurtled back towards the foot of the finishing climb.

Visma took up the reins in the peloton ahead of the first ascent of Mûr-de-Bretagne with 15km to go, and Simon Yates’ pace-making there whittled the yellow jersey group down to just 30 or so riders.

Vingegaard’s teammates continued their forcing over the other side, with Wout van Aert attempting to forge clear. The idea, it seemed, was to try to shed Van der Poel and Pogačar of their teammates ahead of the final ascent, but UAE Team Emirates-XRG tried to bring order to affairs in the final 10km.

The finale was marred, however, by a heavy crash in the yellow jersey group that saw Almeida, Jack Haig, Santiago Buitrago (Bahrain Victorious), Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) and Eddie Dunbar (Jayco-Alula) among the fallers.

Although Almeida was able to remount and continue, his podium hopes suffered a heavy blow in the incident. The loss of Almeida also changed the dynamic for the final climb. Pogačar had only Tim Wellens to lead him out at the base of the climb, that didn’t lessen his ambition. 

Wellens led the world champion into the base of the climb and Pogačar proceeded to accelerate with 1.7km to go.  Inevitably, Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) and Vingegaard came with him, and the Belgian came through and controlled from the front thereafter.

None of the trio was eager to press on the pace, and their waiting game allowed the front group to swell to ten riders beneath the flamme rouge. Crucially for Pogačar, Narvaez was among their number and the Ecuadorian's long, long lead-out teed up the Slovenian for the final sprint.

Pogačar's effort was of such violence that only Vingegaard could follow. The Dane never looked like coming around him, but he will be heartened to have stayed the course here after a heavy defeat in the time trial. For now, however, the yellow jersey is back on Pogačar's shoulders and it doesn't look like it will be easy to take it off him.