Jumbo-Visma tried to ‘kill’ the Tour de France and failed – Jonathan Vaughters on stunning Tadej Pogacar win

They may have taken the yellow jersey, but Jumbo-Visma’s plan to “kill” the 2023 Tour de France backfired on Stage 6 according to EF Education-EasyPost boss Jonathan Vaughters.

Jumbo-Visma picked up the pace on the legendary Col du Tourmalet with 50km remaining, with Wilco Kelderman and Sepp Kuss combining to obliterate everyone in the bunch except their man Vingegaard and Pogacar. Vingegaard soon went on the attack himself before the summit – but, unlike his devastating move on Stage 5, he could not shake Pogacar and the pair set off together in pursuit of the day’s breakaway.

With Wout van Aert up the road having got in that break, Jumbo-Visma called on him to drop back, pick up Vingegaard and Pogacar, and then drag them into the front group. The Belgian drove a fierce pace into the final climb before eventually pulling aside, exhausted, with 5km to go as the big two sailed clear.

But the biggest twist was yet to come. With 2.7km remaining, Pogacar blasted clear and Vingegaard could not respond as the Slovenian powered to victory by 24 seconds to reignite his bid for a third Tour crown.

While Jumbo-Visma grabbed the yellow jersey, with Vingegaard taking over from Jai Hindley (Bora-hansgrohe), it seemed scant reward given Pogacar’s impressive win and the energy expended by Vingegaard, Van Aert, Kuss and Kelderman – something Vaughters was keen to highlight.

“I wouldn’t say they played it perfectly,” Vaughters said on The Breakaway.

“They are so strong, and they have such an abundance of talent on that team, that sometimes they overplay it. They’ve got so much horsepower, they think ‘we can just stonk this race out’.

“Vingegaard blew out a tremendous amount of energy today, while Pogacar was always on the wheel, playing the lame duck like ‘gosh, you were so much better than I was yesterday, I’m just a little humble Tadej’. And then he took advantage of all that saved energy to spend it right at the end and win.”

Still, Jumbo-Visma’s tactics were not without merit.

“You can forgive them though for underestimating Tadej Pogacar,” McEwen said after Stage 6.

“After yesterday they thought: ‘Hit him while he’s down. He lost a minute in a kilometre on the Marie Blanque. This is the time, double the advantage, go again, hit him while he’s struggling.’

“Well he wasn’t struggling today and it turned out to be the other way around.”

But Vaughters was not prepared to let Jumbo-Visma off so lightly.

Asked what he would have done differently were he the team’s sport director, he replied: “It was actually Vingegaard who was having to do the work.

“Sure, turn it up on the Tourmalet but keep Kelderman and Kuss there. It was really early and they didn’t need to do that. Had they taken it with a bigger group to the bottom of the Cauterets, I don’t think Vingegaard would have lost any time.

“But they chose this tactic that was like ‘we’re going to kill the race today’ and it didn’t work.”

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