Wout Poels wins maiden Grand Tour stage as Jonas Vingegaard fends off Tadej Pogacar to maintain GC lead

Wout Poels (Team Bahrain Victorious) won Stage 15 of the Tour de France with Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) and Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) crossing the line in tandem as the Dane sustained his 10-second lead in the GC. After a relative general classification stalemate on Stage 14 of the Tour, much was expected on Stage 15’s summit finish up Mount-Blanc, but, as with yesterday, drama, in the form of a crash, came early. Ad A fan appeared to clip Sepp Kuss with 128km to go.

No rider had to abandon, but fellow Jumbo Visma rider Nathan van Hooydonck was among the most badly affected by the incident. The winner would ultimately come from the 36-man escape which was allowed by the leader's team to establish a sizeable advantage after the crash. Tour de FranceVingegaard lacks the confidence to attack Pogacar — Blythe3 HOURS AGO The second big Alpine stage of this year's Tour began in perfectly cool racing conditions in Les Gets, a ski resort within in the Hautes Savoie department of Les Portes du Soleil.

The summit finish and so little time separating the top two made a showdown between them a near certainty. The 179k course consisting of nothing but ups and downs, beginning with the former, pointed towards a big breakaway day. And so it proved, although the escape took some time to form, only coming together in dribs and drabs, beginning with an accidental solo slide away from Nils Politt (Bora-Hansgrohe) over the first 40km.