Tadej Pogačar shows his Tour de France form on the steep slopes of San Luca - 'Confirmation that I'm strong'

Every autumn, the steep slopes leading up to the Santuario Madonna di San Luca play host to the strongest climbers in the world, with the likes of Primož Roglič, Enric Mas, and Aleksandr Vlasov having scored wins at the Giro dell'Emilia on the hill overlooking Bologna.

On Sunday, the 2km climb – christened the Côte de San Luca by Tour de France organisers ASO – was in the Grand Tour limelight for the first time since the 1984 Giro d'Italia as its French counterpart came to town.

The climb, this time situated on a closing circuit 12km from the finish in downtown Bologna, saw Moreno Argentin celebrate an early victory en route to third place overall behind Francesco Moser and Laurent Fignon 40 years ago.

In 2024, it was a modern legend, Tadej Pogačar, who made the headlines as he lit the fuse on the Tour de France GC battle on day two, taking his main rival Jonas Vingegaard with him and racing into yellow himself.

He was the first man to jump on the steepest slopes of the climb, leaving little response behind him, barring the Dane, who dispelled any doubts about his early race form by sticking in the wheel.

"I did a really good attack, and I was happy that I could explode the contenders a little bit," Pogačar said after the stage. "Jonas was quite fast on my wheel and he was really strong. We went to the finish and then Evenepoel and Carapaz came in the last kilometre as well."

The four men crossed the line together 21 seconds clear of the chasing group, which included Tour de France GC contenders Primož Roglič, Enric Mas, Egan Bernal, as well as now former yellow jersey Romain Bardet.

Pogačar now inherits the maillot jaune from the French veteran, though it's perhaps a gift he didn't want.

After the finish he was caught on camera speaking to Evenepoel – now in white as best young rider – asking if the Belgian had taken the lead and noting that he had "left a gap in the final a little bit" to try and foist the jersey, including its myriad media and podium obligations, onto his rival's shoulders.

Despite that exchange, Pogačar and his team insisted they were happy to be in the race lead for the first time since the race hit the Alps two summers ago.

"It was a good stage. I did a good effort, and it feels good to be in yellow again. Last year I was so close and then I cracked. It's good to be in yellow even if it's without any margin. It's confirmation that I'm strong," Pogačar said. 

UAE Team Emirates sports manager Joxean 'Matxin' Fernández agreed with his leaeder.

"The yellow jersey in the Tour de France is always welcome," the Spaniard said. "It's perfect. They're the two big names in the Tour de France. They're both the winners of the past four Tours de France. We're here to win. It's the perfect war on the bicycle and on the bicycle, Jonas is Jonas."

The team can quite easily rid themselves of yellow – if they so wish – in the coming week. Plan A for the remainder of the Tour de France surely doesn't include 19 more days of extended podium ceremonies and press conferences – on stage 3, Evenepoel only needs a handful of places on Pogačar to jump into the overall lead.

There was no talk, yet, of that from the new leader, however. Instead, the post-stage focus lay in getting a gauge on the form of his rivals.

"It was the moment to try and see what the level is of the other riders. It's good to understand that" Matxin said, once again agreeing with his leader.

"It was a good enough final to test the legs of me and of other contenders," Pogačar concluded. "Today went quite normal and the breakaway went really good. They took almost 10 minutes, and we knew that we had a small chance to win the stage, so we didn't want to suffer on the front for maybe a victory."