Tour 2025: Pogacar Dominates Mountain TT, Vingegaard Overtakes Struggling Evenepoel

Tadej Pogacar won the mountain time trial to Peyragudes as expected. The Slovenian was once again dominant on this Pyrenean giant, handing his big rival Jonas Vingegaard nearly forty seconds. The Dane did gain a small confidence boost along the way: he caught Remco Evenepoel, who had started two minutes earlier.

The Tour de France prepared on Friday for another day full of time gaps with a 10.9 km uphill time trial to the top of Peyragudes. This caused significant stress for the riders lower in the general classification before the start. Would they be dropped by – presumably – Tadej Pogacar? The Tour jury shared the concerns and decided to expand the time limit to forty percent even before the stage began.

Then the calculations could begin immediately. If the winner completed the climb in 22 minutes, only times faster than 30:48 would qualify. That proved to be a tough benchmark early on after the time trial started. Tim Merlier and Luka Mezgec finished their efforts in 31:27 and 31:27 respectively, meaning they nervously awaited how Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard, and Remco Evenepoel would perform. photo: Cor Vos © 2025

We had to wait a while for serious benchmark times on the first part of the stage. The riders who start first and sit low in the overall classification aren’t there because they excel at climbing. However, one time trialist distinguished himself early: 132nd in the GC, Luke Plapp. He finished in 24:58, posting a time that would stand for a long time.

Riders like Lenny Martinez, Santiago Buitrago, Bruno Armirail, and Julian Alaphilippe – all solid climbers – would not beat that time in the hours that followed. So the wait began for the GC contenders to see how much the Australian’s effort was really worth.

Even the GC riders around the top 20 struggled to beat Plapp’s time. Adam Yates missed it by seventeen seconds, Simon Yates lost minutes. Sepp Kuss also took a long time to match Plapp’s mark. The first rider to record a new best time was Primoz Roglic, who shaved 38 seconds off and posted 24:20.

Top contenders start, Evenepoel loses more time
By then all the GC riders had set off, and the wait began for the split times of the top riders. At the first checkpoint, it was already clear that the classification order seemed to be respected. Pogacar recorded the best time after four kilometers, followed by Evenepoel (+4 seconds) and Vingegaard (+8 seconds).

Pogacar then steadily pulled away. At the second checkpoint, his lead over Vingegaard was already 23 seconds and over Evenepoel 1 minute and 20 seconds. It was clear the Belgian world champion was falling apart, as after the second checkpoint Evenepoel had also been passed by riders like Roglic, Lipowitz, and Jorgenson. The final sector was even harsher, when he was overtaken by Vingegaard – who had started two minutes earlier.