L\u2019ALPE D\u2019HUEZ
\nTadej Pogacar stormed to victory in a record-breaking time on Alpe d\u2019Huez amid a \u201ccrazy atmosphere\u201d on Friday\u2019s 19th stage as he extended his overall lead at the Tour de France.
\nHaving launched his attack with 12km left, the reigning champion finally caught Richard Carapaz and Lenny Martinez inside the final two kilometres.
\nHe then surged clear with 800m left and in doing so broke late Italian Marco Pantani\u2019s 31-year-old record for the Alpe d\u2019Huez ascent.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s very cool to win up here — it was a crazy atmosphere,\u201d said Pogacar.
\n\u201cIt was thanks to all the team that I could pull it off in the end.
\n\u201cI was riding for the team-mates today and it was a great victory.\u201d
\nSeveral of Pogacar\u2019s UAE Emirates-XRG team-mates have been suffering with illness and injury, while Brandon McNulty abandoned the race on Thursday with flu-like symptoms.
\nPogacar had made up close to three and a half minutes since the foot of the climb and once he caught the leaders, he wasted little time in leaving the pair in his wake.
\nHis time of 35min 26sec was more than a minute quicker than Pantani\u2019s mark from 1995.
\n\u201cI just wanted to do a good race and to win. A 30-something years record finally broken is good for us,\u201d said Pogacar.
\nIt was a fifth stage victory this year for the 27-year-old Slovenian and a 26th in total since the four-time winner\u2019s Tour debut in 2020.
\nAnd, incredibly, it was Pogacar\u2019s first stage victory on Alpe d\u2019Huez — a remarkable statistic for a man who has dominated cycling for the last six years.
\nMartinez trailed home six seconds behind Pogacar, with Carapaz, who had won the 18th stage the day before, third at 9sec.
\nPogacar increased his lead in the overall standings to more than seven minutes on Olympic champion Remco Evenepoel, who finished the stage sixth, two and a half minutes down.
\nThe two-time world champion is now within touching distance of a record-equalling fifth Tour victory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
L\u2019ALPE D\u2019HUEZ Tadej Pogacar stormed to victory in a record-breaking time on Alpe d\u2019Huez amid a \u201ccrazy atmosphere\u201d on Friday\u2019s 19th stage as he extended his overall lead at the Tour de France. Having launched his attack with 12km left, the reigning champion finally caught Richard Carapaz and Lenny Martinez inside the final two kilometres. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-558440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-sports"],"yoast_head":"\n