Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) has struck the final blow in the mountains at the Tour de France today, winning stage 20, but it is Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo Visma) who will win the race overall tomorrow in Paris, barring incident.
While Thibaut Pinot (Groupama FDJ) flew the flag for the romantics until deep into today's penultimate stage - leading solo after attacking from the breakaway - the general classification men picked off all the escapees and went on to fight for the stage victory.
The top three today - pulling away on the final climb of Col du Platzerwasel after passing all the breakaway men - was comprised of Pogačar, Vingegaard and stage 17 winner Felix Gall (AG2R Citroën Team). With Pogačar and Vingegaard unwilling to commit to the pace-setting up front, it was left to Gall to press on, in a desperate - and always futile - bid to better his general classification position.
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While the Austrian towed the two big names along for the longest time, the fact he was the only one working in the three-man lead group let the Yates brothers - Simon (Jayco AlUla) and Adam (UAE Team Emirates) - back into contention; that duo catching the leading trio just after the last climb on the run in to the finish.
That left a five-man group to go on and contest the finish in Le Markstein after 133.5km of racing, with three chasers just behind - Pinot, Warren Barguil (Team Arkéa Samsic) and Pello Bilbao (Bahrain-Victorious).
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The leaders held off the chasers by 33 seconds and while Vingegaard went early in the sprint, trying to win the stage, Pogačar was much stronger and easily won, with Gall coming through for 2nd after just pipping Vingegaard, who was 3rd.
Carlos Rodríguez (Ineos Grenadiers), who started the day 4th overall, crashed badly early in the stage; hitting the deck on a descent and suffering multiple cuts and bruises, including a gash around his left eye. He finished in the third group on the road, led in by Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Pro Cycling Team) some 50 seconds down on the leaders after being aided by team mate Tom Pidcock, who had been in the early breakaway.
The time loss suffered by Rodríguez meant he relinquished his 4th place overall, slipping one place to 5th, at the expense of Simon Yates. At the top of the general classification, Vingegaard has a massive 7:29 over Pogačar, though the Dane watched his rival in the finale today - checking back at him over and over again - as if just seconds separated them.
Adam Yates is next, in 3rd place at 10:56, while Simon Yates is now 4th at 12:23 and Rodríguez is 5th at 13:17 followed by Pello Bilbao (Bahrain-Victorious), at 13:27.
Three-time stage winner Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) holds the green jersey, with 377 points compared to his nearest challenger, Mads Pedersen (Lidl Trek), on 258 points. Pedersen today spent much of the early phase of the stage riding on the front of a large early breakaway for team mate Giulio Ciccone so he could mop up the early climbers' points and guarantee his victory in that classification, which he did.
Pinot, who rode his heart out at the front until caught the by the best of the general classification men on the final climb, led the race solo up the Petit Ballon climb, where his fans were packed by the roadside to cheer on their retiring hero. While his attempt at stage victory was a spirited one, he was ultimately not strong enough to hang on, though he received the combativity award today.
