Tour de France: Mohoric hammers to victory in Le Creusot

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Matej Mohorič (Bahrain Victorious) proved himself to be the best rider from a very strong breakaway to win stage 7 of the Tour de France.

Also present in the breakaway was the yellow jersey of Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix), who as a result extended his lead on GC, as well as Wout van Aert (Jumbo-Visma), Kasper Asgreen (Deceuninck-QuickStep), who as a result move up into second and third, respectively.

The group of favourites finished well adrift at 5:15 behind Mohorič and 3:35 behind the rest.

The Slovenian arrived at the finish 1:20 ahead of Jasper Stuyven (Trek-Segafredo) and third place went to Magnus Cort (EF Education-Nippo), who was another 20 seconds back.

Tadej Pogačar, whose UAE Team Emirates domestiques had to endure a long, hard chase after letting such a strong group go, was present in the group, as were all the other top GC favourites, with the striking exception of Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma).

Roglič was dropped on the Signal d’Uchon climb 18km from the finish, presumably still suffering from the injuries sustained from his crash on stage 3. He eventually made it to the finish almost four minutes down on the group of favourites, and is surely now out of the running for the yellow jersey. 

The absence of any Jumbo-Visma teammates dropping back and helping him suggests that his team believes he does not have the legs to compete for GC, despite an encouraging time trial a couple of days ago.

His woes on the climb prompted Ineos Grenadiers to put the knife in, as they upped the pace on the climb, before Richard Carapaz launched an explosive attack.

Although Carapaz was able to open up a gap of over 30 seconds, a committed chase from Movistar and EF Education-Nippo managed to bring him back on the finishing straight, meaning he gains no time.

Any fears that the longest Tour de France stage since the 2000 edition might have boring stretches were happily dispelled on a day full of action. The sight of the yellow jersey riding hard at the front of the breakaway was a spectacular one, and it will be fascinating to see how he, Van Aert and Asgreen ride on tomorrow’s first Alpine test, having gained such a big advantage over the climbers on GC. 

Amid all the excitement, it should not be forgotten just how brilliant a ride it was from Mohorič to take the stage win. The Slovenian arrived 1:20 ahead of Stuyven, who he dropped on Signal d’Uchon, and 1:40 ahead of the chasing group containing Van der Poel and Van Aert. 

“I knew that today was a good stage for me,” said a delighted Mohorič while warming down at the finish. “I checked through the road book for the other stages, so I knew how much to focus on one day only. There is practically only one more stage that suits my characteristics, so I thought maybe it was a good idea to go and try and win a stage.

“I somehow got into the breakaway, but then I saw it had super-strong riders, so I didn’t think I could make it on the last climb if I waited. So I decided to try and go early.”

Mohorič made his move with Brent Van Moer (Lotto-Soudal) on the first classified climb of the day, Côte de Château-Chinon, 88km from the finish. 

“I didn’t think I would go after the first KOM, because I was just sprinting for the jersey. But then, when there was a gap, I thought: ‘why not?’."

After being joined by Stuyven and Victor Campanaerts (Qhubeka-NextHash), he then went solo on Signal d’Uchon, an attack which turned out to be the winning move. 

“I rode steadily, with in mind how many kilometres there was to go. Then, kilometre by kilometre, they were ticking off, and I was still feeling OK. I just pushed all the way to the line, and I really couldn’t believe it until the last kilometre.

“I won stages at the Giro and the Vuelta, but this is something else completely. This is the biggest race in the world. I think it will take some time to settle in.” 

How it unfolded

With such a long, rolling parcours of 249.1km, Friday was expected to be the first chance for a breakaway to make it to the finish and contest the stage, and therefore there was a big battle to get into the break at the start of the day.

After several attempts fizzled out, eventually a 29-man group succeeded in getting a significant gap, with the yellow jersey of Van der Poel himself involved.

Rather than ride defensively in an attempt to defend the jersey, Van der Poel’s move was a characteristically aggressive one, but he was joined in the break by one of the main threats to his lead, his great rival Van Aert, who was third on GC at just 30 seconds. 

Pogačar’s UAE Team Emirates were anxious about letting such a large group up the road, especially given the presence of Vincenzo Nibali (Trek-Segafredo), who was the highest placed rider in the break aside from Van der Poel, Van Aert and Asgreen in 19th at 2-55. Although not expected to challenge for the GC this year, he can not be completely discounted as a possible contender while he remains that high on GC.

Also present was Mark Cavendish (Deceuninck-QuickStep), who yet again defied expectations at this race to steal a march on the main rivals for his green jersey. With no other contenders in the break, he was able to take maximum points unchallenged at the day’s intermediate sprint 115km into the stage, meaning he extended his lead to 66 points ahead of Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Fenix) on a day he might have expected to see it decreased. 

Bolstering the group’s strength was the presence of several other notoriously powerful rouleurs and climbers like Victor Campenaerts (Qhubeka-NextHash), Søren Kragh Andersen (Team DSM), Mohorič,  Philippe Gilbert (Lotto-Soudal), Stuyven, Simon Yates (Team BikeExchange) and Patrick Konrad (Bora-Hansgrohe), and was rounded out by Toms Skujins, (Trek-Segafredo), Harry Sweeny, Brent Van Moer (Lotto Soudal), Mike Teunissen (Jumbo-Visma), Imanol Erviti, Ivan Cortina (Movistar), Magnus Cort, (EF Education-Nippo), Michael Schär, Dorion Godon (AG2R Citroën), Jan Bakelants, Danny Van Poppel (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert), Dylan van Baarle (Ineos Grenadiers), Christophe Laporte (Cofidis), Hugo Houle (Astana-Premier Tech), Franck Bonnamour (B&B Hotels) and Ruben Guerreiro (EF Education-Nippo), although Guerreiro dropped back after apparently suffering some kind of problem. 

With such a large group featuring such powerful riders, UAE Team Emirates faced a tough chase to keep it contained. The gap between the peloton and the break kept growing until it exceeded six minutes about halfway into the stage. 

On the Côte de Château-Chinon 88km from the finish, which marked the beginning of the hillier second half of the stage, Mohorič and Van Moer attacked the rest of the break, and gained a gap so that Mohorič could gain maximum points over that climb and the next, the Côte de Glux-en-Glenne. 

Stuyven and Campanaerts set off in pursuit of the leading duo with an attack 54km from the finish, and joined them 8km later to form a new leading quartet. They worked well together, and increased their gap over the rest of the breakaway to 1:45 by the start of the next climb, the Côte de la Croix de la Libération. 

Mohorič set the pace all the way up the climb, which was fast enough to drop Campanaerts, but their lead was reduced to one minute after several attacks in the chasing group from the likes of Nibali, Konrad and Bonnamour saw it whittled down to just the strongest riders, among them Van der Poel, Van Aert and Yates.

Meanwhile in the peloton, which was still around six minutes down on the breakaway, there was a crash, with Jumbo-Visma’s GC 'plan B' Jonas Vingegaard going down. Fortunately he appeared unhurt.

Nairo Quintana (Arkea-Samsic) was also surprisingly dropped from the peloton, although whether that was down to bad legs, a problem or a tactical manoeuvre to lose enough time to have licence to go out on the attack in the coming Alpine stages was unclear. 

The leading trio began the decisive penultimate climb of the category two Signal d’Uchon with an advantage of around 1:30 over the chasers. Mohorič was once again the strongest of them, and this time managed to drop both Van Moor and then Stuyven on the steep, double-digit gradients towards the top.

Konrad was next over the top having attacked earlier on the climb, while Van der Poel, Van Aert, Nibali, Bonnamour, Skujins, Cort and Asgreen were all who remained in the chasing group after a fierce pace set by Asgreen saw all the others dropped.

After the climb, Cort, Asgreen and Bonnamour attacked and caught Konrad, but together they were too far adrift from Mohorič to still be in contention for the stage win. 

Still keen on taking the yellow jersey, Van Aert launched an attack about 8km from the finish in an attempt to drop Van der Poel, but the Dutchman remained glued to his wheel even as the others in the group were all dropped. 

Van Aert and Van der Poel then worked together, and managed to catch the four-man group just as they arrived at the finish line, although not quite in time for Van der Poel to sprint for the bonus seconds.

After several more stragglers arrived, the peloton eventually arrived at the finish 5:15 down on Mohorič and 3:35 down on the yellow jersey group, just about swallowing up Carapaz after his powerful attack on Signal d’Uchon.