The 112th Tour de France wrapped up on Sunday with an atypical Paris stage that produced gripping cycling in the final laps. Wout van Aert dropped Tadej Pogačar on the last climb of Montmartre to take a big victory, his 10th Tour stage. Champion over the last two years, Tadej Pogačar joins Chris Froome on a quartet of yellow jerseys. He took four stages on the way to the title. Michael Woods was the top Canadian on GC in 52nd.
The Course
It was the first ever start in Mantes-la-Ville. The final day and 50th anniversary of the Champs-Élysées wasn’t the usual champagne procession followed by multiple laps leading to a sprint. First came three traditional laps and then the riders faced the addition of cobbled Cote de la Butte Montmartre three times in the last 40 km. The last crest of Montmartre arrived at 6.1 km to go.
The classification winners led the procession. Ben Healy was voted most combative, Florian Lipowitz wore the young rider white jersey, Pogačar was clad in yellow, Jonas Vingegaard filled out Pogačar’s polka dots and Jonathan Milan was adorned in points classification green.
UAE-Emirates wore a special yellow-splashed kit to commemorate their captain’s win.
Around the 22-km mark, with the pace picked up to a mosey, race organizers announced that the rain in Paris called for the official times to be taken on the fourth crossing of the finish line with 50 km to go.
UAE led the yellow jersey onto the dry Champs-Élysées where Magnus Cort touched off the fireworks. Milan took the intermediate sprint. Lipowitz was on the attack with Quinn “American Try-er” Simmons on Lap 3. Boisterous crowds awaited on Montmartre I where Julian Alaphilippe delighted them by attacking. Pogačar got involved, as did van Aert.
The 30-strong Pogačar-van Aert group headed back to Champs-Élysées where the rain began to tip down. The yellow jersey made a thrust on Montmartre II. Van Aert, teammate Matteo Jorgenson and three others made it over to the Slovenian.
When it heard the bell, the Pogačar Sextet was 15 second clear of the closest chase and pulled out more time on the way to Montmartre III. The rain continued to tip down….
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