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Pogacar touches glory and Vingegaard refuses to give up: what remains of the 2025 Tour

Tadej Pogacar has the Tour on the ropes. He has dominated from the start, winning stages with authority and taking the lead with such a big advantage that it is hard to imagine how he could lose this edition. But this is cycling, and there are still six stages to go, three of them with mountains that could change everything... or at least add a little excitement to the fight for the podium.

The peloton took advantage of the second rest day in Montpellier to recover their strength before the end of the Tour, which, although the winner is almost certain, still promises some serious battles. With a cushion of more than four minutes over Jonas Vingegaard, the Slovenian has the yellow jersey well and truly secured. Behind him, Florian Lipowitz is holding on as best he can, more than seven minutes behind, but still dreaming of a place on the podium.

The eagerly awaited duel between Pogacar and Vingegaard, which everyone wanted to see, remained just that: a wish. The UAE rider put his foot down from the first week and has raced with a calculator in hand... and legs like a locomotive. Vingegaard, far from his best, never found the moment to show him up.

Visma? Weak. A far cry from the formidable team that dismantled Pogacar himself in 2022. This time, they lacked spark on the key climbs and didn't have the legs to set the race alight. The Dane has barely been able to defend his second place, with his eyes more on the rear-view mirror than on the yellow jersey. The anti-Pogacar plan didn't work, and now all that remains is to hope for a miracle in the Alps.

The liveliest battle is for third place on the podium. Lipowitz is doing well, but he still has to keep an eye on names like Carlos Rodríguez — who is ninth but with room to climb — and a very compact group that includes Vauquelin, Roglic, Gall, Johannessen and Healy. All within less than two minutes. Here, it could be anyone's game until the last day.

And watch out, because the Alpine menu is breathtaking: on Tuesday, Mont Ventoux returns, a brutal classic, with its 15.6 km at 8.7% and that Martian landscape that has made more than one rider lose their mind. A high-altitude appetiser to whet the appetite.

On Thursday comes the main course: the queen stage with 5,400 metres of climbing, the Glandon, the Madeleine and the finish at the Col de la Loze, which rises above 2,300 metres. A perfect setting for fireworks... if anyone dares.

And if that weren't enough, no one can relax on Friday: Saisies, Prè, Roselend and the finish at La Plagne, another colossus of almost 20 km. Here, the podium could be decided, and perhaps, just perhaps, Pogacar will have to work harder than usual to keep his throne.

Saturday is a relatively quiet day in the Vosges, ideal for breakaways. And on Sunday, a triumphant ride through Paris with an Olympic touch: the cyclists will pass through Montmartre, in honour of the 2024 Paris Games, before the traditional parade down the Champs-Élysées. If there are no last-minute dramas, it will be the day Pogacar seals his third Tour and continues to climb the ladder towards cycling history.

The yellow jersey is almost a certainty, but the Tour, as always, is not over until the podium in Paris. And that, fortunately, has not happened yet.