The Tour de France is here. After a team time trial with new rules, we have our first look at everyone’s form.
So how are the main contenders performing so far? Here’s how our rankings look after stage one. Stage 2 (Tarragone – Barcelone – Stade Olympique) is hilly and should provide exciting racing, but isn’t likely to overhaul our rankings unless someone has a bad day.
1. Jonas Vingegaard ↥
Last Year: 2nd
Position: 1
First blood Jonas, though it wasn’t a surprise. His Visma | Lease a Bike team would be expected to win a standard team time trial, and in the new format they launched him to a crushing victory. He takes the first yellow jersey of the race, and while he won’t be wanting to wear it on his shoulders for the next three weeks, he’ll be hoping to wear it into Paris for his third overall victory.
2. Tadej Pogacar ↧
Last Year: 1st
Position: 3 (+12″)
The Tour defense slash attempt at matching the overall record is going to plan so far. Third in the general classification, 12 seconds behind Vingegaard. And let’s be real, you’d expect Pogacar to make up 12 seconds on anybody in the world over three weeks. He’s down one place in our rankings because Cyclry is red in tooth and claw, but he’s smiling, enjoying his cycling, and very dangerous.
3. Remco Evenepoel ↦
Last Year: DNF
Position: 5 (+19″)
It’s first blood to Remco, who’s fighting a secondary race this year. He finished ahead of his co-leader Florian Lipowitz by 16 seconds. It’s not a terribly unexpected outcome, but with the Red Bull team juggling two riders who’ve finished on the podium in the past two editions, any daylight between them helps make sense of who to support when push comes to shove.
4. Isaac Del Toro ↥
First Appearance
Position: 6 (+26″)
The next-gen riders are about ready to breakout, though Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard stand in their way. Del Toro, winner of the Dauphine this year and second in the Giro last year, is 22 and looks the real deal and can climb with the best. As Pogacar’s teammate, he’s more likely to bury himself in the mountains than chase the GC, though he’s likely to do well in the latter anyway. He’s 26 seconds behind Vingegaard after the opening team time trial.
5. Florian Lipowitz ↧
Last Year: 3rd
Position: 8 (+35″)
Florian Lipowitz emerged as the breakout star of last year’s Tour, shedding his winter-sports background to comfortably hang with the elites in the high mountains. This year, he’s competing with Remco Evenepoel for the Red Bull – BORA – hansgrohe GC leadership. For now, he’s 16 seconds behind Evenepoel and 35 seconds behind race leader Jonas Vingegaard.
6. Paul Seixas ↦
First Appearance
Position: 10 (+39″)
Seixas carries the weight of French expectation at this Tour. And it’s a heavy weight to carry. The hype around the 19 year old is justified, but fans should tether their expectations to reality for now. He sits in tenth place after the first stage, a strong debut.
7. M. Placeholder ↦
Don’t sweat it. There are 184 riders on the start line and we can’t rank them all here every single day without ending up institutionalized. There are some real talents though, and as soon as one qualifies to join the list we’ll make sure they’re here. Just a little British laissez faire for our week-one rankings (the French should have a term for this).