Escape artist Carapaz wins - Evenepoel surprises in the sprint finish
The seventeenth stage of the Tour de France is for the breakaway riders. At the finish line in Superdévoluy, Olympic champion Richard Carapaz crosses first. In the battle for the yellow jersey, Jonas Vingegaard conceded defeat twice against his rivals.
The favorites for the victory in the 111th Tour de France took no break before the upcoming Alpine challenges. Tadej Pogačar attacked Jonas Vingegaard about five kilometers before the finish line in Superdévoluy, a winter sports resort, but the Danish title defender could initially repel the attack. Then, the two-time Tour winner sprinted again and finished a few seconds before Vingegaard. It was a mini power demonstration. Both gave a preview of the upcoming tough mountain stages.
Exceptional rider Pogačar continues with a comfortable lead of 3:11 minutes over Vingegaard. The Belgian time trial world champion Remco Evenepoel even finished before the two favorites and gained some time. He stands 5:09 minutes behind Pogačar in third place.
Bauhaus bids farewell to France
For Carapaz, it was his first stage win at the Tour de France in his career. He had achieved stage wins only at the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a España. In 2019, he even won the Giro. The climber was particularly pleased because the winner of the gold medal from Tokyo (2021) was not nominated by his national federation for the upcoming Paris Games. Jhonatan Narvaez will participate instead.
Phil Bauhaus did not witness Carapaz's victory as part of the peloton. The cyclist announced his departure from the Tour de France a day after his second place in Nîmes. Like the previous year, the 30-year-old sprinter ended the French Grand Tour prematurely. The day before a hilly stage, the sprinters had their last chance for a stage win at the Tour.
Girmay wins the intermediate sprint
At the beginning of the race, the attention was on the general classification riders around superstar Pogačar and the sprinters. The breakaway groups had it tough in the final part of the race. The upcoming mountainous stage with 2850 meters of altitude in the Alps officially welcomed the breakaway riders. At the end, there were three climbing categories' worth of mountain passes on the schedule.
However, the focus was on the sprinters around Jasper Philipsen and the Eritrean sprinter Biniam Girmay in the first part of the race. After Girmay's crash the day before, Philipsen shortened the gap to the leader of the green jersey by winning the stage. But at the intermediate sprint, about 64 kilometers before the finish, Girmay crossed the line before Philipsen. There are still three remaining intermediate sprints for the fast riders until the finish in Nice.
The breakaway riders are once again in demand on Thursday. They must cover five smaller climbs on the 18th stage between Gap and Barcelonnette, a distance of 179.5 kilometers. On Friday and Saturday, there are each two hard Alpine stages ahead. On Sunday, the Tour de France ends with an individual time trial in Nice.
Despite the challenging Alpine stages looming, Tadej Pogacар continued to dominate, extending his lead over Jonas Vingegaard by nearly 3 minutes. This was a stern test for Vingegaard, who conceded defeat twice during the seventeenth stage. Meanwhile, the Olympic champion Richard Carapaz celebrated his first stage win in the Tour de France, concluding an impressive day for breakaway riders in the cycling sport.
