Tour de France: Defending champion Pogačar wins the longest stage and takes the yellow jersey

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Tadej Pogacar

Photo: Yoan Valat/EPA

Defending champion Tadej Pogačar has won the sixth stage of the 109th Tour de France and thus also taken over the yellow jersey.

The Slovenian won the 219.9 kilometer longest part of this tour from Binche in Belgium to Longwy ahead of Australian Michael Matthews and Frenchman David Gaudu.

Pogačar thus edged out Belgian Wout van Aert from first place overall.

Van Aert, who had been at the front for hours as a soloist, had to let go after a long breakaway attempt in the final stages.

In the first 60 kilometers through Belgium it was not possible to establish a breakaway group.

Then leader van Aert tried it himself after 72 kilometers and was able to pull away with the Dane Jakob Fuglsang and the American Quinn Simmons.

However, the trio was not left out for more than three and a half minutes.

Van Aert's escape kept the pace consistently high.

After three hours of racing, the average was 50.2 kilometers per hour.

Despite the work of several teams, it was only eleven kilometers before the finish line that Van Aert was able to catch up.

He had long since shaken off his two companions.

The performance of the 27-year-old was once again impressive.

It was only on Wednesday that he practically single-handedly pushed his captain Jonas Vingegaard back up the cobblestone stage, allowing the Dane to lose just 13 seconds to Dominator Pogačar.

It goes to Mount Doom

In the overall standings, Pogačar is now four seconds ahead of American Neilson Powless and 31 seconds ahead of last year's second Vingegaard.

The German team Bora-hansgrohe suffered a minor setback when captain Alexander Vlasow fell eight kilometers from the finish and ended up losing five seconds.

After the longest stage, the favorites have to show their form at the first mountain finish on Friday.

The seven-kilometre climb to La Super Planche de Belles Filles is particularly challenging at the end.

There are gradients of 20 and 24 percent, and the road is partly unpaved.

The Planche is actually a ski slope, discovered ten years ago by the tour organizers and included in the program for the first time.

Since then, the ascent in the Vosges has been something of the destiny of the tour.

Chris Froome (2012), Vincenzo Nibali (2014) and Pogačar (2020) won there and ended up winning the Tour.

Fabio Aru (2017) and Dylan Teuns (2019) did not succeed despite their success on the planche.

ngo/dpa