Tadej Pogacar bares teeth to take stunning Super Planche win and extend GC lead at Tour de France

No gifts. A sprint win followed by victory on the 24-percent gravel ramp of La Super Planche des Belles Filles – is there anything Tadej Pogacar cannot do?

The Slovenian superstar followed up his win in Longwy with an immediate triumph in the yellow jersey, skipping past Jonas Vingegaard in the closing moments to celebrate another famous win with an almost apologetic punch to the air.

The UAE Team Emirates leader left it very late to make his decisive move, Pogacar waiting until his rival Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) attacked from his slipstream in the closing moments of the brutal final climb. Their burst of acceleration broke the heart of Germany’s Lennard Kamna of Bora-Hansgrohe, the last man standing from the day’s breakaway who came within fifty metres of glory.

Pogacar’s back-to-back wins sees the 23-year-old stretch his lead to 35 seconds over nearest challenger Vingegaard in the general classification. Britain’s Geraint Thomas (Ineos Grenadiers) is up to third place on GC, at 1’10”, after he took fifth place on the stage. The Welshman crossed the line alongside Kamna 14 seconds in arrears and just behind Slovenia’s Primoz Roglic, who helped launch team-mate Vingegaard after another impressive performance following his crash on the cobbles.

Roglic rises 15 places to 13th in the standings, 2’45” down on his compatriot, despite admitting that every pedal stroke “is like a knife in the back”. The 32-year-old will at least be relieved to have emerged unscathed from the location of his darkest moment – the same climb where he lost the 2020 Tour to Pogacar on the penultimate day’s time trial.

“It was really, really difficult – especially the last part at the end on the gravel, when Jonas attacked,” Pogacar said after the eighth stage win of his illustrious Tour career. “He was so strong. I got my guys to push really hard before the final climb because I knew my family were watching from the bottom. I’ve wanted to win this stage since the route was announced – it was a big goal today.”

The two-time champion was full of praise for the rider whom he denied what would have been a maiden Tour stage win. “I think right now [Vingegaard] is one of the strongest climbers in the world – probably the best climber in the world – and a really compact rider with a really strong team around him.”

On his giving no gifts, Pogacar added, ominously: “I extended my lead a little bit today but in cycling no gap is enough.”

French duo David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ) and Romain Bardet (Team DSM), Spain’s Enric Mas (Movistar), Britain’s Adam Yates (Ineos Grenadiers) and the American Sepp Kuss (Jumbo-Visma) all finished in the top 10 after a gravelly gradient so steep that South Africa’s Louis Meintjes (Intermarche-Wanty-Gobert) crossed the line on foot after running up the last ramp.

Yates stays in fourth on GC at 1’18” while Gaudu rises to fifth at 1'31" after a shake-out that saw Russia’s Aleksandr Vlasov (Bora-Hansgrohe) dropped out of the top 10 after being distanced on the final climb.

Vlasov’s team-mate Kamna was part of a strong 10-man breakaway that opened up a maximum gap of over three minutes on the UAE-led peloton as the race headed into the Vosges mountains via two smaller third-category climbs. The breakaway was whittled down to five riders as they commenced the final climb with a slender gap of 1’25”.

But any hope Kamna had of adding a second career Tour stage win to his name were extinguished in cruel fashion at the death despite the German’s brave effort to defy the force of nature that is Pogacar.

Another super-fast start to the day saw the peloton rampage through the first hour at breakneck speed before a breakaway finally produced a bit of daylight on the front of the race.

Germany’s Simon Geschke (Cofidis) slipped into the move just as he was being pegged back following an early attempt to go clear with Italy’s Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers). Geschke dug in once Ganna was called back to the peloton on his radio, and the German was rewarded for his persistence when the cavalry came in the form of a strong 10-man move that formed with 124km remaining.

The breakaway included the rider who last won atop the gravel ramp of La Super Planche back in 2019, the Belgian Dylan Teuns (Bahrain Victorious), as well as the man who settled for yellow that day after finishing second, the Italian Giulio Ciccone (Trek-Segafredo).

Ciccone was joined by Danish team-mate Mads Pedersen in the move that also included Vegard Stake Laengen (UAE Team Emirates), Kasper Asgreen (Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl), Imanol Erviti (Movistar), Luke Durbridge (BikeExchange-Jayco) and Cyril Barthe (B&B Hotels-KTM).

But it was the presence of Bora-Hansgrohe duo Kamna and Max Schachmann which made the UAE team of race leader Pogacar come to the front of the peloton to lead the chase for their double champion.

With Germany’s Schachmann moving into the virtual yellow jersey as the gap grew above the 2’03” by which he trailed Pogacar going into the stage, UAE called back Norway’s Laengen from the breakaway in order to fully commit to the cause.

After Pedersen won the intermediate sprint at Gerardmer, with Wout van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) extending his green jersey lead behind, Bora’s German duo took matters into their own hands with an attack ahead of the first of two Cat.3 climbs that preceded the summit showdown.

Ciccone, Pedersen and Asgreen were instantly jettisoned on the Col de Grosse Pierre as Teuns dug deep with Geschke to ride back to a leading trio of Kamna, Schachmann and Durbridge. Geschke pocketed maximum points over the summit – as he indeed did on the subsequent climb of the Col de Croix after Barthe and Erviti battled back to make it seven out in front.

Heading down the long descent preceding the first real mountain test of the Tour, the advantage of the breakaway – which had grown above three minutes – was halved as the teams of the GC favourites prepared for the big battle.

Geschke made the first move on the final 7km climb but was soon pegged back by Kamna after the German danced clear of Teuns with 5km remaining. With UAE driving an infernal pace behind, it wasn’t long before all escapees bar Kamna were swallowed up. Hoping to add to the Giro stage win from earlier this summer, 25-year-old Kamna buried himself ahead of the extra gravel section to the finish – his gap was still 50 seconds ahead of the flamme rouge.

Kamna’s chasers would have struggled to see the lone leader through the dust being kicked up by the race vehicles – and just when it looked like they had left it too late, Vingegaard stepped on the pedals on the steepest 24-percent section to spark a response from the man in yellow.

With Kamna passed on the final sweeping bend before the line, Pogacar continued his acceleration over the brow of the summit to soar past his Danish rival with just metres to spare. Another win, another 10 bonus seconds. Another Tour? Time will tell – but it looks that way, right now.

The race continues on Saturday with a foray into the Jura mountains with the undulating 186.3km Stage 8 from Dole to the Swiss city of Lausanne, where another ramped finale may reopen the door to Van Aert – but could just as well provide the setting for Pogacar’s third win in as many days.

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