Tour De France: O’connor Climbs To Stage 18 Victory As Pogacar Keeps Grip On Yellow

Tadej Pogacar conquered his demons connected nan Col de la Loze to agelong his advantage successful yellowish arsenic Ben O’Connor won shape 18 of nan Tour de France successful a hailstorm. On nan upland wherever Pogacar famously cracked successful 2023 arsenic Jonas Vingegaard rode distant to his 2nd Tour crown, Pogacar was nan 1 gaining clip 2 years later arsenic a precocious excavation astatine nan acme saw him adhd 11 seconds to an wide lead that now stands astatine 4 minutes 26 seconds complete Vingegaard.

Oscar Onley, nan 22-year-old Scot, hung pinch nan 2 main favourites until nan past 500m of this sadistic 171.5km shape from Vif which took successful 3 hors categorie climbs, gaining 39 seconds connected Florian Lipowitz to move to wrong 22 seconds of nan podium pinch 1 upland shape left.

Stage honours belonged to O’Connor, who attacked connected nan vale roadworthy betwixt nan Col de la Madeleine and nan last climb, leaving Einer Rubio down 16km from nan acme of this 26km agelong climb pinch double digit gradients and hail awaiting nan riders connected nan constrictive motorcycle way to nan summit.

The Australian came to this Tour targeting nan wide classification but saw those hopes dashed by injuries sustained successful a stage-one crash, and has had to recalibrate his ambitions to realise his 2nd profession Tour shape win, and first since 2021.

The penultimate upland shape of this Tour was different opportunity for Vingegaard’s Visma-Lease A Bike squad to effort to isolate Pogacar, and they made their first large moves connected nan Madeleine. Pogacar’s UAE Team Emirates-XRG lieutenants fell distant but recovered earlier nan climb up done Courcheval.

Vingegaard tried a precocious onslaught but it was Pogacar who came complete nan apical to separator person to a 4th profession Tour crown. “Today was brutal,” Vingegaard said. “Five hours successful nan saddle. I’m not judge I’ve ever done specified a difficult shape successful nan Tour. I felt good, we had large plans, you could spot that. We tried to spell early and we did but unluckily we could not summation immoderate time. The squad were amazing. I want to convey my team-mates. I deliberation we were beautiful equal, [Pogacar] took a fewer seconds successful nan extremity but nan Tour is not over.”

Jeremy Whittle’s study will travel shortly