After two sweltering hot days in Barcelona, the general classification of the Tour de France is taking shape, without many major early losers and a top 10 that resembles what most people would have predicted before the Grand Départ kicked off on Saturday morning, but it has given some clear indications of how the 113th Tour might play out.
Tadej Pogačar is not yet in the lead of the GC standings, nor has he won a stage, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t looked every bit the invincible racer he has been for the past three seasons. He dominated the finale of stage 2 so much that he was able to decide the winner.
Isaac del Toro was the victor on Montjuïc as the first road stage played out over three laps of a punchy circuit around Barcelona’s iconic sporting hill, but had he not been wearing a UAE Team Emirates-XRG jersey on Sunday, Pogačar would have without doubt left him for dead in the sprint.
The young Mexican is operating as Pogačar’s super domestique on his Tour debut, but also should be a second option and main contender for the podium. He was allowed by his leader to soar around the final corner heading into the uphill sprint and hit out for glory.
Vingegaard tried to respond but lacked the punch, and as the polka-dot jersey of Pogačar seemingly sauntered round the outside of his long-term rival with ease, the world champion could already tell the day was won – all he had to do was cover any latecomers, but none came quick enough.
He looked back once, twice, then several more times before the line as his rivals and most importantly Vingegard faltered in the UAE duo’s wake. At the line, Remco Evenepoel coming around the Dane and taking third meant there were no gaps between the first four riders on the road, but this was a psychological blow, not one based on winning the yellow jersey on day two.
If Vingegaard and Visma winning the team time trial on stage 1 was them scoring an opener, then UAE, Pogačar and Del Toro just combined to equalise, cutting his overall lead in half to just six seconds from the world champion.
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Vingegaard did point out how, because there was no big attack from Pogačar, “we didn’t really see how strong he is, but also how strong I am,” pointing to the possibility that while the Dane’s punch may not be as good as it was 12 months ago, his long climbing could well be at new heights after a Giro d’Italia win and almost completely issue-free season.
It was quite the image to see the two UAE riders, every bit the master and the prodigy, both with their arms aloft at the line, as their main rival for this race was left gritting his teeth and out of breath, hunched over in the drops after a brutal sprint. A sprint in which Pogačar certainly had another gear, had he needed it.
Not only did Pogačar have the stage finale in control, but he also had the very rare luxury of deciding whether he wanted to take the yellow jersey or not, in the end allowing Vingegaard to hold onto it and with it be forced into another long post-stage procedure or podium presentations and media commitments.
All the UAE superstar had to do, having successfully given the polka-dot jersey away to the breakaway, was celebrate with his team, holding a Mexican flag aloft at the team bus, having surely confirmed race-long commitment to the fullest for Del Toro with the gift of a stage – if the pair’s friendship didn’t already mean that was a given.
“Class @tadejpogacar love you,” read Del Toro’s Instagram post after stage 2, before he thanked the Mexican supporters in Barcelona, of which there have been plenty with cries of “Torrito!” bellowing from the crowds every day so far, and even asked: “Who can we talk to about getting Tadej a passport?”
The first real high mountain test of this year’s Tour arrives on stage 6, when the Pyrenean icon of the Col du Tourmalet rears its head at cycling’s biggest race once again, and Pogačar will be expected to dominate.
With UAE Tour, Tirreno-Adriatico and Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes winner Del Toro as his lieutenant, and elite climbers Brandon McNulty and Adam Yates to boot, race leader Vingegaard would have to be in the shape of his life to match. So it’s a good thing for Visma and the competitiveness of the race that it appears that way.
How do Sexias, Evenepoel and the rest sit after Barcelona start?
The past six Tour yellow jerseys may have been shared out by Pogačar and Vingegaard, but this edition has been billed as one with more than a two-horse race, with super talent Paul Seixas and Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe duo Evenepoel and Florian Lipowitz in the conversation.
Despite that, a team time trial and one road stage in Barcelona have left those two modern Grand Tour greats in the top spots overall, with all other hopefuls on time gaps – but only narrow ones.
Evenepoel, while disappointed to lose the team race against the clock and to have missed out on stage 2 after opting to try and sprint into a gap in the final uphill, has been impressive in his first race since late April, proving so far that the prolonged period away from racing was his best option.
The Belgian star sits 15 seconds down after two stages, well within striking distance of the two ahead of him, but stages 1 and 2 were both days that should have suited him, so being away from those two again, and having already made a tactical error, highlights the point of difference.
Pogačar and Vingegaard are incredibly consistent, both finishing first or second in all of their Grand Tour appearances since their respective debuts, a quite ridiculous record considering the stresses and drama that follow that much three-week racing.
For debutant Seixas, this has been a baptism of fire, and he would’ve felt the full brunt of the Tour on the first road stage, suffering a mechanical before the entry onto the Montjuïc and being forced to change bikes twice, once onto a teammate’s and then back onto his once it was fixed.
A calculated chase back saw him play out the finale in the lead group, but his Decathlon CMA CGM team, too, made tactical errors, launching a lead-out through Tiesj Benoot heading towards the final sprint when Seixas wasn’t looking to do so.
“There was a slight problem with my earpiece. I was trying to tell them I was lacking a little bit of energy to attack, but the sports director didn’t understand,” explained Seixas after the stage.
“He thought I was at 100%, so he had Tiesj do the work, even though I wasn’t planning on attacking. In the end, my legs felt better than I expected, but I prefer to save some energy for later.”
Even still, at 19, it’s quite remarkable that he is only 42 seconds away from Vingegaard’s lead and 36 seconds down on Pogačar. He’s certainly in the fight, but the gap to the leading duo remains.
Lidl-Trek’s Juan Ayuso can be very satisfied with his performances over the two Barcelona stages, performing well in the heat to sit only 19 seconds down heading into the first French finale to Les Angles on Monday.
Ayuso hasn’t matched the punch on the climbs yet, and he will have more to answer for when the high mountains arrive, but it’s not long ago that he was the young super talent everyone was talking about – he might just finally be realising that potential at the Tour, however.
The main loser over the opening two days – and that is without having lost much time at all, given how decisive and difficult the final week is, with double days to Alpe d’Huez up different sides – is Evenepoel’s planned co-leader, Florian Lipowitz.
Dropped by his teammate on the opening team time trial, he failed to follow the pace set on the finale of stage 2, losing another 10 seconds at the finish. Far from race ending, but as he now sits 30 seconds down on the Belgian, Red Bull’s hierarchy is being decided on the road in favour of Evenepoel.
Lipowitz, in a similar ilk to Vingegaard but even more magnified, though, is a man for the long climbs and not at all a puncheur, so he too could see a complete change in standing once those higher mountains are reached.
All in all, it’s a GC picture which sets things nicely up for that first proper mountain day on stage 6 to Gavarnie-Gèdre, with almost all of the would-be protagonists within a minute of the lead, but Pogačar and Vingegaard still seem to be in a league of their own, with Del Toro the closest to joining them.
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