Jai Hindley of Australia won the first mountain stage of the Tour de France after the cruel climb of the Col de Marie Blanque saw Adam Yates’s race leadership evaporate and then exposed the frailties of his UAE Emirates team-mate, the former Tour champion, Tadej Pogacar.
As Bora-Hansgrohe’s Hindley rode alone over the climb and sped down the descent into Laruns, to win the stage and take the maillot jaune of overall race leadership, the defending champion, Jonas Vingegaard, left Pogacar in his wake, one kilometre from the summit. It may yet prove a definitive moment in this year’s race.
Hindley, riding his first Tour, seemed stunned by his solo success. “I didn’t really expect this when I rolled about of bed this morning,” the 27 year old said. “I’ve been watching the Tour since I was six years old and never thought I’d find myself in the yellow jersey.”
Hindley was one of a group of 17 riders that formed over the top of the first major ascent of the 2023 Tour, the “beyond category” Col de Soudet, before descending through the Pyrenean mist to the foot of the next climb, the Col d’Ichere.
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Although he had spoken earlier this week of the need to ride conservatively, Hindley proved quick to seize the day. “If an opportunity presented itself, I was going to make the most of it,” he said.
Among those alongside him in the breakaway was the former world road race champion, Julian Alaphilippe, of Soudal-Quickstep, Wout Van Aert, Vingegaard’s Jumbo-Visma team-mate, and Felix Gall, a former junior world champion, riding for AG2R Citroen.
In the ebb and flow of the day’s breakaway, Hindley and Gall were the constants and as the stage reached a climax, their consistency paid off, as the pair moved clear towards the top of the Marie Blanque.
But it was Hindley who made the decisive move, attacking on the steepest ramps to leave Gall behind. The Australian admitted that his reconnaissance of the stage had paid dividends. “I did have a look at this stage,” he said. “I know the last 90km pretty well, the run-in, the descent and the final climb.”
Behind him, Vingegaard too was seizing the day, attacking Pogacar and quickly opening up a significant gap. “The main focus for Jonas today was to avoid Pogacar taking too many seconds,” Jumbo-Visma team manager Merijn Zeeman said, “and also to make it hard for UAE Emirates. We smelled the chance on the Marie Blanque. It was a good day to make it hard.”
“I don’t really think Pogacar cracked,” he added, “but Jonas was stronger today. And UAE didn’t have the numbers on the Marie Blanque.”
But Zeeman does not underestimate Hindley. “He’s a Giro winner and he’s one of the few to have won a Grand Tour. He’s very strong. He had the balls to do it, so big respect to him.”
Pogacar, meanwhile, was worrying about matters beyond the Tour, after hearing that his partner and fellow professional, Urksa Zigart, had crashed in the Giro Donne, the women’s Tour of Italy, and may have a concussion. “That’s more sad than losing one minute to Jonas,” Pogacar said.
Vingegaard, the Slovenian said, had spotted he was struggling on the Marie Blanque. “For the last two kilometres on the climb, I was on the limit. He could see I was going full gas and tried to attack. I couldn’t follow.”
By the finish, Vingegaard, the Jumbo-Visma leader, had significantly eroded a chunk of Hindley’s advantage and struck a blow to Pogacar’s morale, taking more than a minute from the winner of the Tour in 2020 and 2021.
Five stages in and already it feels like the die may have been cast. Vingegaard has already put Pogacar to the sword, much as he did on the Col du Granon Alpine stage a year ago. After all the speculation over Pogacar’s fitness, following his wrist injury, it now seems clear that Vingegaard is the rider to beat in this year’s Tour. – Guardian
