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Wednesday, July 9, 2025

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2024 Tour de France | 2024 Giro d'Italia

If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality. - Desmond Tutu

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Bill and Carol McGann's book The Story of the Giro d'Italia, A Year-by-Year History of the Tour of Italy, Vol 1: 1909 - 1970 is available in print, Kindle eBook & audiobook versions. To get your copy, just click on the Amazon link on the right.

Current racing:

• July 5 - 27: Tour de France
• July 9 - 13: Tour of Austria

Upcoming racing:

• August 2: San Sebastian Classic

Latest completed racing:

• June 21 - 29: Most national road championships
• June 24: Giro dell'Appennino
• June 15 - 22: Tour de Suisse
• June 18 - 22: Baloise Belgium Tour
• June 8 - 15: Critérium du Dauphiné
• June 13: GP Kanton Aargau
• June 8: Brussels Cycling Classic
• May 9 - June 1: Giro d'Italia

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Tour de France stage four reports

We posted the race organizer's report with the results.

Here's the report from stage winner Tadej Pogacar's UAE Team Emirates-XRG:

Roaring to the line in Rouen, Tadej Pogačar won stage 4 of the Tour de France in sensational style, and in doing so, reached 100 career victories at just the age of 26. Racing his whole professional career with UAE Team Emirates-XRG, Pogačar becomes the fourth-quickest rider in history to reach the landmark.

The milestone was celebrated with aplomb beyond the line, as Pogačar was greeted by his teammates Jhonatan Narváez and João Almeida. Both riders proved crucial to Pogačar’s hopes in the finale, as stage 4 exploded over a series of challenging climbs late in the day.

Benefitting from a tremendous lead-out by Almeida on the uphill kick to the line, Pogačar burst around Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) in the final 100m and would not be stopped by his rivals. Wearing the Yellow Jersey, Van der Poel hung his head with disappointment as Pogačar posted up in celebration, reversing the fortunes of both riders from Sunday’s stage 2.

Tadej Pogacar wins TDF stage four. Sirotti photo

With Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) in third place and Almeida rounding out the front group of six riders across the finish line, the stage results tell the tale of how difficult Tuesday’s finale proved.

No less than three categorised climbs were packed into the last 22km of racing from Amiens Métropole to Rouen, and with the help of his UAE Team Emirates-XRG teammates, Pogačar ensured that the race was as challenging as possible for his rivals.

Reflecting on his 100th victory after the line, Pogačar spoke of his delight at reaching the landmark wearing the rainbow jersey as world champion, with Team Principal Mauro Gianetti heaping praise on Pogačar’s teammates.

Pogačar: “I tried with an attack on the last climb and Jonas followed me, before everything came together. João did such an amazing job to lead me out right until the end, even if other people were attacking, so I am super happy and proud for the team today. They were amazing. I am just without words, it was such a nice victory.

“To win at the Tour is incredible, in this jersey, even more. To have 100 victories is amazing.

“There are so many good riders in the final, you are always a bit on the edge and nervous. You never know what is going to happen, and you never know until the final. Like today, you get this adrenaline and it is pure racing – I really enjoy it.”

Gianetti: “It is an amazing victory in front of two incredible competitors in Mathieu van der Poel and Jonas Vingegaard. For us, it is an incredible day because I think all the team showed we are here, we are strong, and we are committed to Tadej.

“From Sivakov, Yates, Soler, Wellens, Politt, and then in the final, Narváez and João, they were incredible. Tadej capped it off with a great sprint and a great victory.”

It's 100 career victories for Tadej Pogačar

How Pogačar made it to 100 career wins:
Just four riders were in the breakaway of the day on stage 4, with the peloton recognising that the final 30km of racing would decide the winner. For UAE Team Emirates-XRG, this meant that earlier in the day, Nils Politt came to the fore and piloted his teammates into position for the challenges ahead.

When it came to crunch time, Pavel Sivakov was the first to put his nose to the wind, mopping up the remainder of the day’s break as the three all-important categorised climbs approached. Flanked by Marc Soler, the pair soon traded efforts through-and-off, ensuring that the pace remained as high as possible in the peloton.

Into the last 20km, Tim Wellens emerged at the front, sporting his all-polka-dot skinsuit as the leader of the King of the Mountains classification. The Belgian national champion led the race into the final few hundred metres of the Côte de la Grand’Mare – the penultimate climb – before Visma-Lease a Bike grabbed the reins through Victor Campenaerts.

Settling into the wheels, both Jhonatan Narváez and João Almeida wisely saved their powder for the Rampe Saint-Hilaire (800m at 10.6%), which would prove the final categorised climb of the day.

With a little under 6km to ride, Narváez plundered his way to the front and led the peloton from the very base of the climb. The Ecuadorian national champion’s pace-setting was scintillating, with riders dropping like a stone from the back of the pack. Almeida’s 200m pull would ramp up the difficulty even further, before Tadej Pogačar made his own attack at 5.4km from the finish.

Soon enough, only Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard remained at the front of the race, with Pogačar’s attack ensuring he would end the day in the polka-dot jersey. Though the pair were caught on the descent to the final ramp to the line, Almeida had recovered well enough to deliver a second impressive turn on behalf of the world champion.

With 3.2km to go, Almeida returned to the front of the race. Despite a series of attacks from other contenders, Almeida closed each and every gap, before producing an excellent lead-out for the final sprint. Mathieu van der Poel was the first to open up an acceleration, but the Dutchman proved no match for Pogačar in the end.

With his win, Pogačar moved level on time with Van der Poel in the general classification, ahead of the 33km-long individual time trial that will pit the GC contenders against one another on Wednesday afternoon.

Here's the Tour report from Remco Evenepoel's Team Soudal Quick-Step:

Remco Evenepoel did a great effort in the closing part of Tuesday’s nervous stage in Normandie, shutting some dangerous moves and staying with the small group that fought for victory in Rouen, which helped him gain a spectacular twelve places in the general classification ahead of the race’s first individual time trial.

Remco Evenepoel heads to the start of stage four. Sirotti photo

Amiens – home of a stunning Gothic cathedral built two centuries before the Fall of Constantinople, around the time that Marco Polo travelled through Asia along the Silk Road – hosted the start of stage four, which took the peloton to Rouen, the city of Jacques Anquetil. Born in a suburb of Rouen, the Frenchman had a career that stretched over 16 years and became a legend of the sport, having built an impressive palmares that featured a total of eight Grand Tours, Liège–Bastogne–Liège and the Hour Record.

The capital of Normandie, Rouen returned at Le Tour for the first time since 2012, with a much different finale than the previous one, when the sprinters took center stage. Now, back-to-back short and steep hills made for an explosive last 20 kilometers, gradually whittling down the peloton and leaving only some 20-odd riders at the front. The race exploded on the 14% gradients of the final classified climbs, where two riders took off; behind, Remco Evenepoel was the one who took an incredibly long pull in order to make up ground and join them, which he did on the descent.

Others soon followed, making it a ten-man group for the uphill battle in Rouen. Soudal Quick-Step’s leader took seventh on the line – his first top ten of this edition – as Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) sprinted to victory. Thanks to this strong result, the Belgian is ninth overall after four days at Le Tour, less than a minute from the yellow jersey wearer.

“The final 20 kilometers were incredibly hectic, but we were always at the front, and I must thank Max Schachmann for that, because he did a great job keeping me there. The whole team was solid today and we can be content with the way things played out. Now it’s time to recover and see what I can do in the time trial”, Evenepoel said at the finish.

Here's the Tour de France report from Axel Laurance's Team INEOS Grenadiers:

Axel Laurance led home the Grenadiers after a punchy stage four finish at the Tour de France.

A hilly and technical finish to Rouen saw a battle between the favourites at the front of the race, with Tadej Pogacar (UAE Emirates - XRG) taking the win, while Laurance and Carlos Rodriguez crossed the line 39 seconds back in the chasing bunch.

The day's early break.

The 174km race saw an early break of four up the road, gaining a two minute lead, before it was all together on the punchy run in to the finish line.

Attacks came thick and fast, with Rodriguez and Laurance just missing the chance to kick and coming home 23rd and 27th respectively.

And here's the Tour stage four report from Team Picnic-PostNL:

With yesterday’s sprint stage behind the peloton, where Team Picnic PostNL took fifth and 11th with Pavel Bittner and Tobias Lund Andresen respectively, a hillier finale awaited them into Rouen on Tuesday afternoon. Depending on the approach and attitude from the peloton, it was a day that could have gone several different ways; so the team approached the stage with multiple options for the finale – whether it was going to be a selective GC and puncheur battle, or more of a reduced bunch sprint.

The day's early break races across Normandy. ASO photo

Staying safe in the peloton while the break was up the road, the team bubbled up well around each other, and began to move up in the final 30 kilometres once those ahead were caught. It was an explosive and hard finale where the pace progressed and ramped up on each ascent, with the bunch reducing every time. Coming into the closing ten kilometres Tobias Lund Andresen, Warren Barguil and Oscar Onley remained in the peloton, but it was clear at that point it was going to be a selective fight. Barguil did a brilliant job to position Onley ahead of the steep climb, where what was left of the peloton completely exploded. Onley followed the very best in the world and made it into an elite group of seven, which grew to ten approaching the last kilometre. Playing it smart and leaning on others to close down any moves, Onley focused all of his energy on the uphill sprint to the line where he kicked to a brilliant fourth place on the day.

Once he caught his breath, Onley expressed while laughing: “If you ask me how I’m feeling right now, the answer is probably something that can’t be published. Before the stage we made the plan to position me going into those final climbs and the guys did a great job at that, with Warren really bringing me forward onto that last steep one. I really went to the limit on that last climb. We knew that you had to be in second wheel or so around that last corner, but the final kilometre was really on legs, and that’s all I had in the end.

"When you have guys like Jorgensen and Almeida to close the gaps, and when it’s flat and fast like that, I was never going to be able to stay away in the end if I attacked. I was really on the limit. It doesn’t get much bigger than this in terms of races and competitors so it’s nice to be able to prove to myself that I can be there right at the top.”

Team Picnic PostNL coach Matt Winston added: “Today was another really good team effort from all of the guys. Coming into the final our sprint group did some good positioning work and we still had Oscar, Tobias and Warren there until the last seven or so kilometres; so we had options to play depending on how the race unfolded. In the end, it was clear that the big GC guys were going to go for it, so Warren then did a superb job to bring Oscar into position; and from there it was down to legs. Oscar played it smart in the final and did the best he could, and we can look back on a really strong fourth place in the stage; and another day where we were in the mix for the win. Since we took Oscar into the team as a young rider, we’ve been working through the Development program with him and then into our Men’s program, and slowly building towards this. We’ve seen glimpses of it, with the win on Willunga Hill, and if you look back at his results over the past 18 months his results have been consistent in the one-week races, so we knew we were making steps and we continue to do so. For us the plan doesn’t change now and we will keep focusing on stages here at the race and see how far we can come there, and if we keep this up then we can be in the fight for more top day results throughout the race.”

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