Carlos Rodriguez took advantage of the rivalry between Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar to catch them and ride away from them in the downhill of col de Joux-Plane to win Stage 14 of the 2023 Tour de France and become the youngest-ever Spanish stage winner at the Tour. The duel between Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) in the Tour de France again provided cycling fans with another thrilling chapter that ended with a draw and with Vingegaard retaining the maillot jaune.
After tons of attempts, attacks, counter-attacks and riders being dropped, a lead group of 21 riders took shape. It included three men from the top 20 overall: Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ), Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) and Mikel Landa (Bahrain Victorious). Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X) and Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek) were very active, both interested in the King of the Mountains competition. Ciccone outsprinted polka dot jersey wearer Neilson Powless (EF Education-EasyPost), Alaphilippe and Pinot at cat. 1 col de Cou (km 35.3). The Italian also crested cat. 1 col du Feu (km 52) first and forged on by himself in the downhill until Pinot, Landa, Alex Aranburu (Movistar) Wout Poels (Bahrain Victorious) and Michael Woods (Israel-Premier Tech) came across. Pinot, Landa, Poels, Martin, Martinez, Ciccone, Alexey Lutsenko (Astana), Alex Aranburu and Gorka Izagirre, (Movistar), Hugo Houle and Woods (Israel-PremierTech) managed to stay away while Jumbo-Visma kept them on a leash.
16 riders were reunited at the front with 30km to go: Van Aert, Sepp Kuss, Wilco Kelderman, Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma), Felix Grossschartner, Rafal Majka, Adam Yates, Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates), Jai Hindley (Bora-Hansgrohe), Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos Grenadiers), Pello Bilbao (Bahrain Victorious), David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ), Simon Yates, Chris Harper (Jayco-AlUla), Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) and Felix Gall (Ag2r-Citröen). The team of the yellow jersey led the charge up to col de Joux-Plane, the 250th hors-category climb of the Tour de France since the inception of the label in 1979. 5km before the top, Hindley couldn’t hold the pace set by Kuss, the American being followed by A. Yates, Pogacar, Vingegaard and Rodriguez. With 3.7km of climbing remaining, Pogacar attacked. The Slovenian remained 4’’ ahead of the Dane for two kilometres. Vingegaard made it across and sprinted to collect 8’’ time bonus and the lead in the KOM competition atop col de Joux-Plane. Rodriguez and Yates made the junction in the downhill. Rodriguez rode away solo with 8km to go and remained at the front till the end. He even moved one step up to take place in the top 3 instead of Hindley for one second.
At the end, Pogacar was 2nd and Vingegaard was 3rd, both at 5” to Rodriguez. Thanks to the time bonuses assigned on Joux Plane, Vingegaard increased his lead over Pogacar by 1 second, and the gap between 1st and the 2nd in the GC is now 10 seconds.
“I think it was a really good day for us, we were really strong, okay we didn’t win but we pushed hard and go in the next stages with a positive mind,” Pogačar said after the stage. “Where this Tour de France can be decided? Tomorrow a really hard stage is coming, then the time trial, stage 17 with the Col de la Loze close to the arrival and also stage 20 could be a key moment. It’s gonna be really tight, but I am going in with a good mindset and good legs for these stages”.
Stage 14 Brief Results
- Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos-Grenadiers) 3h58’45”
- Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) +5”
- Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) s.t.
- Adam Yates (UAE Team Emirates) +10”
General Classification after Stage 14
- Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) 57h47’28”
- Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) +10”
- Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos-Grenadiers) 4’43”
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