Tour de France 2021 – Tadej Pogacar on verge of second title after winning final test in mountains

Another Grand Tour hat-trick from Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) saw the Slovenian extend his lead in the Tour de France after a brutal ride over the Col du Tourmalet and up to Luz Ardiden in Stage 18. An exciting finale saw Pogacar toy with his GC rivals Jonas Vingegaard and Richard Carapaz before dancing clear in the final kilometre to secure his third stage win of the race.

A carbon copy of Wednesday’s finish on the Col de Portet saw the Danish tyro Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) edge Ecuador’s Carapaz (Ineos Grenadiers) for second place, with Spain’s Enric Mas (Movistar) and Ireland’s Dan Martin (Israel Stand-Up Nation) completing the top five after the short but sharp 129km stage from Pau.

Back-to-back summit victories saw the 22-year-old UAE Pogacar stretch his lead to 5’45” over Vingegaard, with Carapaz a further six seconds in arrears ahead of the final GC test – Saturday’s 30km individual time trial to Saint-Emilion. A third stage win matches Pogacar’s haul from his debut Vuelta in 2019 and his debut Tour last year, while his latest display of uphill demolition saw him blast ahead of Dutchman Wout Poels (Bahrain Victorious) in the polka dot jersey king of the mountains competition.

Only an unprecedented collapse far dearer than that suffered by his compatriot Primoz Roglic last year can now deny Pogacar a second Tour de France victory this Sunday in Paris.

Meanwhile, a day to forget for Rigoberto Uran (EF Education-Nippo) saw the Colombian veteran hit the wall on the Col du Tourmalet en route to finishing nine minutes down, dropping from fourth place to 10th in the general classification.

The world champion Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-QuickStep) and Slovenian champion Matej Mohoric (Bahrain Victorious) led the race onto the first of two HC climbs, the Col du Tourmalet, with 50km remaining. Mohoric had gone clear of the pack early on with Chris Juul-Jensen (Team BikeExchange) and Sean Bennett (Qhubeka-NextHash) before being joined by a French duo of Alaphilippe and Pierre-Luc Perichon (Cofidis) after the first of two early fourth-category climbs.

Alaphilippe and Mohoric were joined by a medley or riders on the mythical Tourmalet but some heavy-duty pace-setting on the front of the peloton by the Ineos Grenadiers team of Carapaz sounded the death-knell for most of the escapees and ensured that the advantage over the summit was a matter of seconds rather than minutes.

Once Alaphilippe and Mohoric were swept up, it was the Frenchman Pierre Latour who went over to win the Souvenir Jacques Goddet ahead of compatriot David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ) and Portugal’s Ruben Guerreiro (EF Education-Nippo). Dutchman Poels rode clear of the pack along with his Canadian polka dot rival Michael Woods (Israel Start-Up Nation) to take the points for fourth place and consolidate his lead.

But with such a slender lead in the KOM standings, Poels was now relying on Pogacar failing to finish the day in the top three positions on Luz Ardiden – something that looked highly unlikely when the race hit the start of the final climb with Gaudu the only remaining rider up the road.

Looking to give Groupama-FDJ some joy in what has been a difficult Tour for the French team, Gaudu gave it his best shot – but the tempo set by Ineos behind saw him caught with 10km remaining. A whittled-down main pack contained all the GC riders with the notable exception of Uran, the 2017 Tour runner-up, who had been distanced earlier on the Tourmalet.

A big pull from the 2020 Giro d’Italia champion Tao Geoghegan Hart helped reduce the size of the field and put in the groundwork for a potential Carapaz win. But once the British debutant peeled off, Pogacar’s last remaining UAE teammate, the Polish climber Rafal Majka, came to the front and upped the tempo in what was an ominous sign for anyone not wearing yellow.

Pogacar made his move with 3km remaining with a series of accelerations which only Vingegaard, his American teammate Sepp Kuss, Carapaz and Mas could follow. Kuss, the Stage 15 winner in Andorra, then came to the front to pave the way for the Danish debutant – but once the games of cat-and-mouse began, it was not Vingegaard who came through following a half-hearted dig from Carapaz, but the Spaniard Mas.

Twice the Spanish rider from Movistar opened up a gap in the closing moments – the second time sparking a response by Pogacar, who pounced on the opportunity to add a ninth Grand Tour stage win to his name, and his second in as many days. Asked after his latest win if he had any concerns ahead of Saturday’s time trial, the 22-year-old replied: “Why should I be worried?”

Pogacar had a point: he now has almost six minutes of an advantage ahead of a time trial for which he will be among the favourites to win. He also has a 19-point lead in the KOM standings with just two points remaining between here and Paris – with Poels keeping his polka dot jersey, and Vingegaard his white jersey, safe before the hand-over on the Champs-Elysees.

Before then, there’s the small matter of the green jersey battle and Mark Cavendish’s attempt to become the leading outright stage winner in the Tour’s history. Cavendish (Deceuninck-QuickStep) extended his lead to 38 points over nearest rival Michael Matthews (Team BikeExchange) after kicking clear for scraps at the intermediate sprint ahead of the Tourmalet on Thursday.

Cavendish then bunkered down and concentrated on avoiding the time cut, the Manxman doing so despite finishing in last place on the stage, just over 32 minutes down. In Friday’s 207km Stage 19 from Mourenx to Libourne Cavendish could win a 35th stage that would take him above Eddy Merckx in the standings and cap a formidable comeback.

At the rate Pogacar’s going, mind, Cavendish’s record may not last too long.

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