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Denmark’s Jonas Vingegaard took the yellow jersey on the opening stage of the Tour de France following a tense team time trial.<\/b><\/p>\n
Two-time Tour winner Vingegaard finished the 19.6km course in 21 minutes, 47 seconds – eight seconds ahead of Italy’s Filippo Ganna of the British Netcompany Ineos Cycling team.<\/p>\n
Favourite for the overall win Tadej Pogacar finished third, 12 seconds down on Vingegaard for his UAE Team Emirates-XRG team.<\/p>\n
Pogacar, 27, is looking to try to become the equal most successful rider in the Tour’s history, alongside Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain.<\/p>\n
On a hot evening in Barcelona for the Tour’s Catalonia-based Grand Depart, the race’s first team time trial for seven years saw teams ride in a ‘chain’ formation to establish the quickest time through the city by protecting their lead rider from the wind resistance – with each squad’s seven support riders eventually peeling off to let their team leader cross the line alone.<\/p>\n
Vingegaard, 29, a time trial specialist, has returned to top form since a serious crash in 2024 in the build-up to the Tour caused injuries to his lungs.<\/a><\/p>\n As part of his recovery to be able to compete with Pogacar’s explosive style of riding, Vingegaard has won cycling’s other two three-week Grand Tours, including last year’s protest-hit Vuelta a Espana and May’s Giro d’Italia, in which he won by more than five minutes overall.<\/a><\/p>\n “‘It’s the perfect start,” said Vingegaard, of the Visma-Lease a Bike team. “I didn’t have to do much. To take yellow for me personally after the past few years… it’s nice for me to experience it again. It’s something special.”<\/p>\n While Pogacar will not be too concerned to lose out to the only rider who is considered able to stop him winning a fifth Tour, the Slovenian will know he is racing against his main rival in the modern era on his best form since 2023.<\/p>\n The rider largely considered the third best in the world, Belgium’s Remco Evenepoel finished fifth for his Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe team, 19 seconds down. <\/p>\n France’s big hope for overall victory, 19-year-old Paul Seixas of the Decathlon-CMA CGM team finished tenth, 39 seconds off the pace.<\/p>\n The last French rider to win the men’s Tour de France was Hinault in 1985.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n