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Remco Evenepoel won the individual time trial on stage five of the Tour de France as Tadej Pogacar took the yellow jersey from Mathieu van der Poel.<\/b><\/p>\n
Belgium’s Evenepoel, who is the world and Olympic champion in the discipline, lived up to his billing as favourite on the 33km route around Caen with a stunning performance.<\/p>\n
The Soudal Quick-Step rider averaged 54km\/h to finish 16 seconds quicker than Slovenia’s Pogacar, with Italy’s Edoardo Affini in third, 33 seconds back. <\/p>\n
“I gained positions at every checkpoint. The pacing was perfect and everything was on point, I’m super happy,” said Evenepoel.<\/p>\n
“I did what I had to do to take as much time as possible and step up in GC [General Classification]. It’s kind of the same situation as last year, so I’m happy with that. It’s a big step towards the podium, but there’s still a long way to go. <\/p>\n
“Everybody knows what’s coming next week and the week after. One year, I will come to win the Tour but it’s a bit too early this year.”<\/p>\n
Pogacar was the big beneficiary of the day after an excellent ride of his own as his main GC rival, Jonas Vingegaard, toiled.<\/p>\n
The Dane, who has won the Tour twice, ended the race against the clock in 13th to ship over a minute to three-time champion Pogacar, with Evenepoel moving up to second in the GC standings 42 seconds behind. <\/p>\n
Vingegaard is fourth overall, with promising French rider Kevin Vauquelin 14 seconds ahead of him.<\/p>\n
Dutch rider Van der Poel came home in 18th and drops to sixth.<\/p>\n
The result also means that Pogacar becomes the first rider to wear the yellow, green and polka-dot jerseys at this stage in the Tour since Belgium’s Eddy Merckx in 1970.<\/p>\n
Thursday’s sixth stage is a lumpy 201.5km ride from Bayeux to Vire Normandie, which contains six categorised climbs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n