The lights went out for Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) 12 kilometres from the summit of Alpe d'Huez in the Tour de France on Friday, and he finished over eight minutes behind race leader and stage winner Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG).
Four years on from his Tour de France victory on the same climb, the Briton was forced to head into damage limitation mode, and held onto the top 10 of the GC standings, slipping one place behind Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost), who finished third on the stage.
Pidcock's stage win atop Alpe d'Huez in the 2022 Tour de France, 48 seconds ahead of the now-retired racers Louis Meintjes and four-time Tour champion Chris Froome, remains his sole stage victory in a Grand Tour. However, he has proven his abilities as a GC contender with third place in the Vuelta a España last year - the first podium position in a three-week stage race for the 25-year-old.
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A repeat stage win was far from a possibility for the Briton on Friday after the remnants of a 42-rider early breakaway were caught and dropped by Tadej Pogačar. Pidcock's main task on Alpe d'Huez was to ensure his top position overall remained as intact as possible.
His first ride up Alpe d'Huez since the 2022 victory was far from disastrous, but as he admitted in a statement released by his team on Friday evening, he was in no way feeling good either.
Part of that had been due to his fighting hard to stay with the main GC group on the climb preceding Alpe d'Huez, he said, meaning that when it came to the final ascent, he was already running on fumes.
"That second last climb, I went so deep, I think I paid for that on the last climb; I was dead there," Pidcock explained in his brief statement.
"Of course I had hoped for more, but there was nothing more I had in my legs there, so it is what it is."
Overall, Pidcock has dropped one spot and is now in ninth overall, 21:30 behind race leader Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), and 1:51 ahead of his closest pursuer Jordan Jegat (TotalEnergies), in tenth.
The second ascent of Alpe d'Huez on Saturday on a much tougher day of climbing will likely shake up the GC once more. But in the meantime, and even if he had had a difficult stage, Pidcock still had words of appreciation for the huge numbers of fans on the climb - most of whom will likely be back again tomorrow.
"It's incredible," he added, "The amount of people who come here and watch bike racing - it's amazing, they make the atmosphere."
"My thanks to everybody who comes out and makes it so magical."
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