As it happened: Surprise winner in the bunch sprint at stage 11 of the Tour de France

Hello and welcome to stage 11 of the Tour de France!

After yesterday’s excursion through the climbs of the Massif Central, which saw Tadej Pogačar seal an even firmer grip on the yellow jersey, today the attention reverts back to the sprinters for what looks sure to be a day for the sprinters. There are only two categorised climbs all day, and both of them are only category fours - nothing for the fastmen to worry about.

Tour de France 2026 stage 11 preview

Based on how the previous sprint stages have gone, Tim Merlier is the hot favourite for the win today. Not only has he won two in succession, he’s done so in mightily impressive fashion, coming back from bad positions in the finale to storm past the opposition.

Today might not be quite so straightforward for him, however. Yesterday, he was dropped out of the peloton almost from the very start of the stage, and only managed to avoid the time cut by a matter of minutes - how much will those efforts to do so have taken out of him ahead of today’s bunch sprint?

Tour de France: Tim Merlier claims back-to-back victories on stage 8 with furious sprint into Bergerac

The peloton is one rider short of those who finished yesterday. Chris Harper has pulled out of the race after being one of the riders to fall in a crash late yesterday, and it turns out he will need surgery on the injuries sustained to his hand.

In better news for Pinarello Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team, the other man who went down, Tom Pidcock, is OK to continue, and has said the he thinks he’s going to be OK.

'I've don't think I've ever crashed in a Grand Tour before' – Tom Pidcock bashed up but relatively unscathed after crashing on descent during Tour de France

Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard at the start a little earlier, sharing a word ahead of what should be a more chilled out day for them both. They and the rest of the riders are on the move now and making their way towards kilometre 0.

OFFICIAL START

And they're off! And there's a fascinating development - Mathieu van der Poel is the first rider to attack, despite this seeming like a day for his teammate Jasper Philipsen. What are Alpecin-Premier Tech up to?

This is a much bigger fight to get into the breakaway than on previous sprint stages. Alpecin remain eager to get a man up there, and are among many teams who have tried to clip off the front - to no avail so far.

150KM TO GO

Van der Poel continues to attack, and is still trying to get into the day's move. At face value it doesn't seem like much of a vote of confidence in Jasper Philipsen to amend his poor start in the sprints. But might they have something else in mind? There’s an intermediate sprint coming up in about 15km - perhaps they want him to prevent the other green jersey candidates from taking points there?

Or perhaps they want as hard a stage as possible to try and wear out Tim Merlier and his team before the final sprint? It’s a tricky one to figure out.

Still no breakaway has formed, as multiple attacks keep being made, although Alaphilippe, Charmig, Oliveira and Le Berre have managed to build a lead of a few seconds.

One change from previous days is the weather. It’s still hot on the road, but humid and cooler compared with earlier, and the riders are subjected to the unusual sight of grey skies, while the roads are even still wet from rainfall earlier.

The peloton has sat up, and those four riders - Alaphilippe, Charmig, Oliveira and Le Berre - have a lead of 1:25. It appears we have our break of the day, but they might yet be joined by another rider in Liam Slock, who is trying to bridge up to them. He has 25 seconds still to make up.

The four riders up the road, who have been allowed a lead of 1:40, although that will likely come down as the green jersey teams start preparing for the upcoming intermediate sprint.

It's not looking good for Slock, however - he's drifting further away from the quartet, and is now 45 seconds behind.

INTERMEDIATE SPRINT

After the five riders up the road hoovered up most of the points (with Le Berre sprinting for first), Philipsen won the sprint in the peloton for 6th ahead of Kanter, Pedersen and Girmay.

Notable by his absence was Merlier, who is saving himself for the final sprint - given his difficulties in the climbs yesterday, the relentless effort required in all terrain to chase the green jersey is going to be very difficult for him to win that jersey, so perhaps he is deprioritising it and going all in for more stage wins.

Slock gave up the ghost shortly after the intermediate sprint, called back by his Lotto DS. So we're going to have a four-man break up the road today - bigger than previous sprint stages, but still a manageable size for the sprinter teams to pull back.

Right now it's XDS Astana and NSN assisting Soudal-QuickStep with the pace-setting, and they’re keeping the break at 1:30.

120KM TO GO

The gap's been held at 1:30. Notable by their absence in the chase are Alpecin-Premier Tech. Philipsen might have beat his rivals in the intermediate sprint, but his team are absolving themselves of responsibility of chasing, even having failed to get Van der Poel up the road.

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While the race is in a holding pattern, the peloton keeping the four-man break at about 1:15, let’s reflect upon yesterday’s stage and the impact it had on the GC race.

It was another crushing day for all of those hoping against hope to stop Tadej Pogačar from winning this Tour de France. The defending champion once again rode everyone off his wheel in the finale - but didn’t quite manage to land a knock-out blow, with all of his main rivals limiting their losses to under 45 seconds.

Peerless Pogačar drains tension out of the Tour de France as Jonas Vingegaard's losing battle brings podium scramble into focus – GC analysis

100KM TO GO

Still the gap is at 1:15, with Soudal doing most of the work, supported by Astana and NSN.

Not everyone is appreciating Tadej Pogačar’s dominance at this race. In fact, some fans have been outright hostile, with the Slovenian revealing to the press that he had been booed out on the road yesterday.

While he might have felt he ‘honoured the yellow jersey’ by winning on Bastille Day, the French might have hoped he’d let a break contest the stage, and have one of their home riders take the win - a much needed boost for the nation after being dumped out of the football World Cup.

'They put wood on the fire' – Is Tadej Pogačar's popularity fading as he's booed by 'haters' at the Tour de France?

Talking of the football, it’s now up to Paul Seixas to rescue France’s summer of sport now that their World Cup dream is over. He’s ridden a great race so far, riding consistently and without issue to keep himself right up there in fifth on GC, well within shooting distance of the podium.

Yesterday, he managed to negotiate and survive some dodgy descents, passing yet another test on what has so far been an exceptional debut.

'Extremely dangerous' – Teenager Paul Seixas navigates 'melting' descents at Tour de France to move up to fifth overall on debut

80KM TO GO

Still the gap remains hovering at about 1:30. The weather is warmer out there now, with the clouds having dispersed, and there’s no threat of more rain for now.

The way the stage has unfolded so far, there’s no reason to believe that the predicted outcome of bunch sprint finish won’t come into fruition. Have a read of what some of the leading candidates for the win have had to say before the stage start.

Sprinters welcome rain and cooler weather as Tour de France green jersey erupts again on stage 11 in Nevers

70KM TO GO

The break are being kept on a leash, at 1:30, but a peloton being predominantly led by Soudal-QuickStep.

Alaphilippe will surely have hoped for more than that. He’s the star man in the break, and is hoping to add to his 6 career Tour stage wins - but winning this way, from a breakaway, was always going to be more of a long shot than the stage wins he managed in his heyday, mostly from punchy terrain. He might not have the legs of those days, but still has the same insatiable motivation to chase success.

The weather remains dry for now, but word on the street is that it could take a turn for the worse later today. That could seriously complicate matters when the pace and tension ramps up for the finale.

There’s been a lot of talk about Jonas Vingegaard and his hitherto unknown considerations for quitting the sport. He might have struggled yesterday, but the mood is still good, and he and his team have been talking about how they've talked through and worked on the Dane’s issues.

'Jonas is very open and feels right at home' – How Vingegaard's threat to quit sparked changes and dialogue at Visma-Lease a Bike

The pace has been calm enough in the peloton for Juan Ayuso to spend a lot of time in the convoy sorting something out with his team car. He’s another rider being overshadowed by Tadej Pogačar, but is himself riding a great Tour de France, and is well in the hunt for what would be a first Grand Tour podium finish since the 2022 Vuelta.

'He's doing a different race than us' - Juan Ayuso is in the fight for the podium but accepts Tadej Pogačar is in a race of his own

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40KM TO GO

The gap is as low as it's been for a while, only a fraction above one minute. It's still advantage the peloton, and they might be beginning to wind it up.

COTE DE BILLY-CHEVANNES

Charmig leads the break over the top of the second and final category four climb of the day, the Côte de Billy-Chevannes, to earn a solitary KOM point. But missing now from the break is Alaphilippe, who was dropped towards the start of the climb. The appetite might still be there for the 34-year-old, but the legs no longer are.

Florian Lipowitz in the bunch, near his teammate Remco Evenepoel. Tensions appear to have eased a little between the two, and the talk after yesterday’s stage was of how they can work together to not only target a podium finish on GC, but 2nd place ahead of Vingegaard.

'We can fight for second' – Florian Lipowitz and Remco Evenepoel kick off Tour de France's second week with renewed alliance

CRASH

Three riders have gone down in a crash in the peloton - O'Connor, Zimmermann and another. Zimmermann seems the worst of of the three, and is receiving attention on the medical bike, but is back riding again.

30KM TO GO

For the first time today, Alpecin-Premier Tech have joined in with the pace-setting. With the gap between the peloton and the three breakaway riders still at one minute, they'll need to make a proper effort to bring them back.

Alaphilippe has been dropped out of the peloton, having been caught by it earlier. The peloton is going at a real pace now, brining the three remaining escapees back to within 50 seconds with 25km left to ride.

20KM TO GO

Charmig, Le Berre and Oliveira are pushing on hard, and keeping their chances alive. They lead by 44 seconds - it's close, but still feels unlikely to be enough.

35 seconds now for the break, with 15km left. The gap's coming down, but there's still hope for the three out front.

You can see from the faces of the riders in the peloton the effort that's having to be made to bring this break back. It's still coming down, slowly but surely, now to 25 seconds with 12km left to ride.

10KM TO GO

There isn’t a want of numbers riding at the front of the peloton. Picnic, Alpecin, NSN and XDS Astana are all contributing, although Soudal-QuickStep have eased up having done so much work earlier. With 10km to go, they’ve brought the gap down to 20 seconds.

Mechanical for Fernando Gaviria. That’s disastrous rinsing for the Colombian, who is unlikely to make it back to be in contention for the sprint finish today - the sole thing he is at this Tour de France to do.

5KM TO GO

The gap has plummeted the final kilometres, and the catch has been made. Chapeau to the break for their efforts!

The pace has dropped off again now the break has been caught. No team wants to commit their lead-outs too early, and the peloton has bunched up. Good news for Gaviria - he's back in the peloton again! He will be able to sprint for the stage after all.

At last the pace increases as the enter the final 2km, and NSN take over with a huge acceleration ahead of the final corners.

1KM TO GO

The peloton is all strung out single file again. Uno-X Mobility are leading, for but Philipsen, Kanter and Kooij are up there too

WAERENSKJOLD WINS

Søren Wærenskjold takes the win! After his team's lead-out, he caught all the other sprinters out by starting early, and despite getting close, Kooij and Philipsen couldn't quite close him down in the final metres, having to settle for second and third respectively.

That was an unusual sprint, disrupted when Cees Bol (ostensibly the lead-out man for Kooij) started his sprint early and jumped out of the bunch by a few bike-lengths. Wærenskjold used his slipstream, first chasing him down, then slingshotting past him to take the victory, while the others delayed responding to Bol’s move.

This result really is a turn up for the books. Until today, Wærenskjold’s only stage at World Tour level was at the 2025 Omloop Nieuwsblad, a result that equally took the field by surprise that day.

He follows in the footsteps of riders like Thor Hushovd, Alexander Kristoff, Edvald Boassen Hagen and teammate Jonas Abrahamsen by becoming a Norwegian winner at the Tour de France. And for his Norwegian team, it’s a huge victory, and especially impressive given that they also had a man in the breakaway all day.

Today has also seen a historic Tour de France record - that was the fastest ever road stage in the race’s history, clocking in at 50.9km per hour. That breaks the record of 50.36 set in 1999 by Mario Cipollini.

Tour de France speed record smashed on stage 11 to Nevers as peloton averages 50.9kph

News just coming in - Jasper Philipsen has been relegated, presumably for dangerous sprinting.

This had been an encouraging day for the Belgian, who looked sharper in the final sprint than he has in previous stages. But that decision sees him plummet down the points classification, the green jersey now seeming to be a distant goal.

Here's what the points classification looks like now. With Merlier also finishing well down in the sprint, there's now some daylight between Pedersen and Girmay and the rest.

1 Mads Pedersen 319

2 Binam Girmay 276

3 Tim Merlier 225

4 Jasper Philipsen 215

5 Max Kanter 205

Thanks for joining us today, for what was a part of Tour de France history, as the fastest stage ever ridden.

Tadej Pogačar keeps hold of the yellow jersey, and will likely do so again tomorrow for what is another flat day that should be one for the sprinters. They’ve been wide open affairs so far, with Søren Wærenskjold becoming the third different winner from four sprints. What will tomorrow have in store? Be sure to join us once again to find out as we bring you all the action.