The defending Tour de France winner still holds the yellow jersey after the second week. Who enjoyed stage wins during the Tour?

110. the Tour de France has a second free day on Monday. Participants in the most famous of the three-week stage races have already completed fifteen stages. Who was victorious during the second block of the Old Lady and what does the battle for the yellow jersey look like?

Defending champion Jonas Vingegaard of Jumbo-Visma entered Tuesday’s tenth stage as the leader. However, the Dane’s lead over his Slovenian rival Tadeje Pogačar of UAE Team Emirates was only seventeen seconds.

On the hilly route from Vulcania Park to Issoire, a group of refugees managed to succeed. Pello Bilbao was the fastest of the bunch at the finish, securing the first Tour de France win for Spanish cycling in five years.

One of the biggest stars of the current edition is sprinter Jasper Philipsen, which he confirmed with a winning spurt in Moulins at the end of stage 11. The Belgian from Alpecin-Deceuninck triumphed in the bunch finish for the fourth time.

The twelfth stage, containing a total of five climbing premiums in the lower categories, once again offered a win by a member of the breakaway. Ion Izagirre, the lone Spaniard in the service of Cofidis, was the fastest to the finish in Belleville-en-Beaujolais.

Friday’s thirteenth stage ended with a demanding climb up the Grand Colombier, where former world champion Michal Kwiatkowski of the INEOS Grenadiers team had the most strength. There was a change at the top of the standings.

Pogačar managed to pass Vingegaard in the last hundred metres and cut his deficit. The 2020 and 2021 yellow race champion reduced the time gap to nine seconds on the Danish rider.

Stage 14 took the peloton into the Alps, where another interesting spectacle took place. On the final climb to the summit of the Col de Joux Plane, it first appeared that the Slovenian would be able to successfully attack his rival. But Vingegaard didn’t give up and he won the bonus seconds.

Then there was the descent to Morzine Les Portes du Soleil at the end of which Pogačar got a time bonus thanks to his position. Thanks to his second position behind the winning Spanish youngster from INEOS, Carlos Rodríguez, he is ten seconds behind the leader.

On Sunday, the two favourites reached the finish of another mountain test together. The latter was affected by a mass crash at the start, caused by a fan. After 179 kilometres of hard climbs, Wout Poels was the winner in Saint-Gervais Mont-Blanc.

The Dutchman dedicated his triumph, like his Bahrain stablemate Victorius Bilbao on Tuesday, to the tragically deceased Gino Mäder, who succumbed to injuries after a crash at the recent Tour of Switzerland. Incidentally, the sporting director of this group is former Czech racer Roman Kreuziger.

Apart from the duel at the head of the overall classification, the battle for third place is also quite even. The aforementioned Rodríguez currently has a nineteen-second lead over Britain’s Adam Yates. Australian Jai Hindley rounds out the top five.

The current holder of the polka-dot jersey is Italian Giulio Ciccone, who, although he has 58 points to his credit, like Neilson Powless of the USA, has been the better rider in the higher category summit finishes so far. The green jersey for the points leader goes to Philipsen, the white jersey for the most successful young rider to Pogacar.

The 2023 Tour de France continues after a rest day with a 22.4km time trial in the mountains from Passy to Combloux. The finish will see the participants on Sunday, traditionally on the Champs-Élysées in Paris.

Source: Tour de France