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The race started in the worst possible manner: with a crash. The cause was a slippery road after rainfall. This created a slimy mass on the surface consisting of dust, leaves and droplets of water. For small tires with a high velocity, this is dangerous.
Sneak peek into the data 👇
This is what a massive crash looks like to us, with speeds suddenly dropping to 0 km/h #TDFdata #TDF2023 pic.twitter.com/Oan7kRNK9V
— letourdata (@letourdata) July 15, 2023
As a result, a couple of riders had to abandon.
– Esteban Chaves (EF Education-EasyPost)
– James Shaw (EF Education-EasyPost)
– Ramon Sinkeldram (Alpecin-Deceunink)
– Louis Meintjes (Intermarché-Circus-Wanty)
– Antonio Pedrero (Movistar Team)
– Romain Bardet (Team DSM-Firmenich)
Others carried scratches and road rash away from the scene.
The race was halted to give the riders time to gather themselves, readjust their bikes and get examined to ride on.
Tour de France Stage 14: Results and Standings
Contents
Since the race was restarted, the first climb arrived early and there was no breakaway as usual and the peloton went over the first climb largely intact. Daniel Martínez took two points, Julian Alaphilippe one on this category three climb.
There were 20 riders in a group shortly after the climb, including Alaphilippe and yesterday’s winner, Michal Kwiatkowski. Thibaut Pinot was also in this group. He was the highest placed in the GC of those upfront. The gap was not big, only 20 seconds at this point and the ensuing climb loomed already.
At the top of this ascent, Giulio Ciccone was first to go over the line, followed by Neilson Powless, the man in the polka dot jersey. This was his chance to collect as many points as possible and to bolster his lead for this classification.
On the approach to the third climb, the Col du Feu a smaller group of five got away from the bigger group, Powless was not among them but Ciccone who took another ten points at the summit and moved within twelve points of Powless with two mountains still to come. The Italian added 20 points to his day’s yield as he also won the intermediate sprint.
What was he playing at? Causing a stir or was he really chasing the mountain jersey? There is no answer as the group was swallowed up and Wout van Aerts of Jumbo-Visma was the first to go over the line.
Battle on the Final Climb
It meant that the major battle was about to commence. Finally one may say! Pogačar attacked on the ascent to the Col de Joux Plane with 15 kilometres to go and Vingegaard was not able to keep up. However, he steadied himself and got back to Pogačar. Yet, he did not attack himself. The attack by Pogačar was hampered by a motorbike and people on the roadside.
A rare attack by Vingegaard was futile as Pogačar was not to be shaken off easily. Them slowing down meant that Adam Yates and Carlos Rodriguez caught up with them and they were now four going down towards the finish line.
Rodriguez top in the downhill, Vingegaard and Pogačar guarding each other
On the descent Rodriguez went all in reaching up to 95km/h to get away from his fellow riders. He made it two stage wins in as many days for Ineos-Grenadier. And a first-ever stage win at the Tour for him!
Pogačar attempted to continue his tactic of slicing off seconds of Vingegaard’s lead but the latter has now a ten-second cushion over his rival.
The Top Five of Stage 14
1. Carlos Rodriguez 3hr 58min 45sec
2. Tadej Pogačar +5sec
3. Jonas Vingegaard +5sec
4. Adam Yates +10sec
5. Sebb Kuss +57sec
The Top Ten of the General Classification
1. J. Vingegaard 57:47:28
2. T. Pogačar + 10sec
3. C. Rodriguez + 4min 43sec
4. J. Hindley + 4min 44sec
5. A. Yates + 5mins 20sec
6. S. Kuss + 8min 15sec
7. S. Yates + 8min 32sec
8. P. Bilbao + 8min 51sec
9. F. Gall + 12min 26sec
10. D. Gaudu + 12min 56sec
The King of the Mountains ranking saw a major shake-up today as Jonas Vingegaard has gathered enough points to draw level with Neilson Powless on 54. However, the American will continue to wear as Vingegaard will wear the yellow jersey.
The Top Five
1. J. Vingegaard 54 pts
2. N. Powless 54 pts
3. T. Pogačar 48 pts
4. G. Ciccone 42 pts
5. F. Gall 32 pts
This stage was marred by a massive crash very early on due to rainfall which created a slimy road surface which caused this crash. As a result,
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