Rest Day Recap
2023 Tour de France
Stages 1-9
Neilson Powless (EF) and Jonas Vingegaard (JV) have a moment.Route: 2023 Tour de FranceAs of the first rest day after 9 stages, Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo Visma) is your yellow jersey, holding a 17” advantage over chief rival Tadej Pogacar (UAE).
Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) is your green jersey, racking up the points with three sprint stage wins on Stage 3, 4, and 7.
American Neilson Powless (EF) is your polka dots jersey, with strong performances on an unusually mountainous first week at the Tour de France. He will have to put in serious work to hold onto the prize as the GC competition heats up between Vingegaard and Pogacar, who will look to hurt each other in the mountains.
Major catastrophes were visited upon Movistar and Education First as they’ve seen both their GC competitors withdraw from the race, Enric Mas during Stage 1 and Richard Carapaz before the start of Stage 2.
All the cycling world winced as they watched Mark Cavendish (Astana) go down on Stage 8 and abandon what is supposed to be his final Tour de France. He will remain tied with the great Eddy Merckx for the most Tour de France stage wins.
And America’ national champion Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek) did not start Stage 9 after some nasty spills ended his Tour.
Race observers have called the first week of this year’s Tour the toughest in memory. It only gets harder in the second week as a string of mountain routes bring fear and trembling to the hearts of riders, especially the sprinters. The peloton will need every second of the rest day to prepare for what lies ahead.
Stage 1
Stage 1A banger right out of the gates. No individual time trial to start the three-week tour, which can be a snoozefest right when you want to capitalize on the excitement. Instead it was a hilly course that put pressure on the peloton to keep up with itself.
Vingegaard and Pogacar kept up with each other, by the way. But there were early casualties with big names. Enric Mas (Movistar), the perennial top-10 finisher and would-be GC-hopeful is out. Movistar’s GC hopes in the dumpster before the end of a single stage.
Richard Carapaz (EF) is out with injury, putting a damper on the pink squad’s ambitions for its GC-contender. With Rigoberto Uran and Neilson Powless still on the team, the closest thing to an American team has a lot of firepower and no GC-candidate to spend it on. Is it stage hunting time or does Education First try to pivot the GC mantle to another rider?
And can you ask for a better finish than the Yates brothers going hermano y hermano on the streets of Bilbao? Adam beat out Simon.
Stage 2
Stage 2With Richard Carapaz (EF) out of the race, Neilson Powless (EF) refocused the team’s goals from GC competition to King of the Mountains. The American holds on to the polka dot jersey heading into Stage 3.
Two top GC contenders Jonas Vingegaard (JV) and Ben O’Connor (AG2R) crashed early. No immediate sign of serious injury, and they were back in the pack quickly, but dings like this build up over the course of a three-week race.
Victory for Victor! Victor Lafay wins Stage 2, beating the bunch in the sprint. A Frenchman and a Cofidis rider, no less. The hard luck team hasn’t won a Tour de France stage since 2008.
Stage 3
Stage 3If Wout van Aert (JV) was pissed after losing Stage 2 to a no-name Frenchman (put some respect on that name – Victor Lafay!) from Cofidis, then he must have been ballistic after losing Stage 3 by an even tighter margin. Worse yet, van Aert was arguably boxed out illegally in the closing sprint by the ultimate winner Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin Deceuninck).
The judges ruled it was all fair game and the all-around Belgian cycling god will have to live with fifth on the stage.
And his team Jumbo Visma will have to live with a less dominant (so far) performance in the 2023 Tour de France than they enjoyed last year. In 2022 it seemed like Jumbo Visma won every other stage, with half of those going to Wout van Aert. It made his duty as super domestique for the team’s GC contender Jonas Vingegaard (JV) all the more palatable. There was plenty of winning to go around.
Maybe the boys in black-and-yellow find their stage win mojo later in the race? Maybe it’s just a year to focus on the GC support? Time will tell.
American Neilson Powless continues to build his lead in the King of the Mountains competition, sitting in first place by double-digit points. He will need every point advantage he can get to hold onto the polka dot jersey. When the second, and third, series of mountain stages arrives, GC frontrunners Tadej Pogacar (UAE) and Jonas Vingegaard will come calling.
Stage 4
Stage 4Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) wins two in a row, besting a chaotic bunch sprint. Spills aplenty. Teams will be taking stock of the damage as the bumps and bruises start to add up.
It seems like every Tour there is a sprinter who goes on a hot streak, nabbing a string of stage wins. Is it Philipsen’s year? He’s on great form but more than a few rivals (looking at you Wout van Aert (JV) will be looking to upset his apple cart.
Back in the mountains tomorrow – time for teams to rally around their GC rider instead of simply protecting him from crashes in the pack. Will we see a Pogacar versus Vingegaard battle, or will UAE and Jumbo Visma play out the impending confrontation more slowly?
Stage 5
Stage 5Who says it’s only a two-man race?
Jai Hindley (Bora-Hansgrohe) is no slouch, having won the Giro d’Italia. If top contenders Jonas Vingegaard (JV) and Tadej Pogacar (UAE) want to slowplay the tete a tete, then there are talented riders ready to jump into the break.
Was one of those riders supposed to be Wout van Aert (JV) who wants to jumpstart his 2022 Tour de France all around dominance after missing out with close calls on Stage 3 and 4? It wasn’t in the cards today as the Belgian struggled to keep pace with the fastest men in the breakaway.
Right around the time that the stage win was falling out of reach for Jumbo Visma, Vingegaard surprised everyone and stole away ahead of rival Pogacar, who was unwilling or unable to follow. The gain stuck, with the Dane stealing a minute on the Slovenian by the time both had reached the finish line. The first big mountain stage was supposed to shake things up, but not like this! With Vingegaard in second overall behind the new yellow jersey Jai Hindley, and Pogacar falling to sixth overall, the cycling world will be watching for a quick rebound from the two-time Tour de France winner.
In other news, American Neilson Powless (EF) loses the King of the Mountains jersey while American national champ Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek) takes a hard spill on the deck.
Stage 6
Stage 6You want a rebound?
Tadej Pogacar has a quick rebound after losing over a minute to chief rival Jonas Vingegaard on the previous stage. But it took until the final category 1 mountaintop finish to produce the faceoff.
Before then it was Neilson Powless trying to make his own rebound back into the polka dot jersey. He did it, too, cresting the Col du Aspin first and grabbing necessary points. But the American’s motor gave out following and his teammate James Shaw (EF) was left to soldier on with the lead group.
In the end it was Pogacar versus Vingegaard, the pair working their way up and past the lead group. Vingegaard got a heroic assist from Wout van Aert, but it was the Slovenian Pogacar who found the final push remaining in his legs. Jai Hindley, the man in yellow for a day, was a non-factor in the second half of the race and cedes the jersey to Vingegaard.
Stage 7
Stage 7Another sprint win for Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck)? He takes his third, beating out Mark Cavendish (Astana), who’s hunting one more win for the record books – beating Eddy Merckx for all time Tour de France stage wins
Looks like it’s Alpecin-Denceuninck who is enjoying the string of stage wins this year, looking dominant on the sprint finishes. But they have no GC threat to match Pogacar for UAE or Vingegaard for Jumbo Visma. So enjoy it while you can. The next stage is a bit of a hilly grinder, but no major mountain climbs, so the more durable sprinters might have another chance.
Or a breakaway?
American Neilson Powless (EF) holds on to his polka dot jersey for another day. He’ll be eyeing the mountain finish on Stage 9 as the next major jersey defense moment.
Stage 8
Stage 8After a flat first half, the second half of Stage 8 turned into an up-and-down rock n roller. What was needed was a rider like Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) who can keep his sprint legs on hilly finishes. And he proved many pre-race prognosticators correct by nabbing his win, edging out this tour’s dominant sprinter Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) and the all-around wizard Wout van Aert (JV), who came in second and third, respectively.
The GC battle remains largely untouched, with hopefuls looking at the mountain finish on Stage 9 as a battleground for most elite team leaders.
The big news, though, was the crash and abandon of the great sprinter Mark Cavendish (Astana) who was eyeing one more Tour de France stage win to break the record of all-time legend Eddy Merckx. It was not meant to be, as it’s been said that this will be the Manx Missile’s last Tour. With the first rest day landing after Stage 9, the commentariat will have plenty of time to chew over the career of one of the sport’s greatest sprinters.
Stage 9
Stage 9A heartbreaker for American Matteo Jorgenson (MOV) who looked in the clear for a stage win with around 2km left up the Puy de Dôme. And who shatters the dream of a stage win but Michael Woods (Israel PremierTech). The Canadian rider has had his own share of heartbreak with near misses on big stages, so maybe it’s karma, and a nice win for a team like Israel Premier-Tech that doesn’t have a real stake in the GC competition.
Another American Neilson Powless (EF) racked up the mountain points earlier in the stage to add to his polka dots jersey lead. He was out on the break all day and let up a bit on the final climb, ceding about a minute-and-a-half to the ultimate stage winner. It’s academic; Powless will wear his polka dots jersey into the rest day.
Everyone expected fireworks between Jonas Vingegaard (JV) and Tadej Pogacar (UAE) up the Puy de Dôme. The pair burned through their helpers and Pogacar made his move with about 1.5km to go, as Vingegaard followed. The Slovenian maintained a slight gap, but didn’t scrape back more than 8 seconds from the Dane at the finish.
On to the rest day!
Photo Gallery
All 21 stages at the 2024 Giro d’Italia.