Tour de France – twin coup in Bilbao: Yates brothers celebrate double victory

The Slovenian led a group of twelve chasing him to the finish line and, thanks to the bonuses, made up four seconds on defending champion Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo – Visma), who crossed the finish line in ninth place at the same time.

Bora hansgrohe captain Jai Hindley was seventh in the stage and was unscathed in terms of the fight for the podium on the difficult opening day.

A second large group of 28 men around Romain Bardet (DSM – Firmenich), Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers), Emanuel Buchmann (Bora – hansgrohe), Felix Gall (AG2R – Citroen) and Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin – Deceuninck) brought 33 seconds loss of time to the finish.

“I do not know what to say. We wanted to prepare an attack for Tadej. He attacked but then it happened on the descent: I approached from behind, my brother came up front and then we worked together. At first I didn’t know if I could drive with him. I asked on the radio and they told me to drive,” said the first wearer of the yellow jersey, describing the decisive situation on the descent from the Cote de Pike to Bilbao.

And of his twin brother, who is five minutes older than him and hasn’t competed in a race since his retirement from the Tour de Romandie at the end of April, he said: “I knew Simon was in good spirits, I talk to him every day. It’s great to share this experience with him. He almost left me behind once. I’m just really happy.”

“I’m here for Tadej, he’s the boss”

Adam Yates wore yellow for four days three years ago. “It was a special moment back then,” he recalled. “But I want to keep my feet on the ground. I’m here for Tadej, he’s the boss. He’s already shown to be the best in the world. In the next few weeks he’ll show that again, I’m sure. “

On the other hand, the unluckiest of the day were Enric Mas (Movistar) and Richard Carapaz (EF Education – EasyPost), who fell about 25km from the end on the penultimate descent of the day. Carapaz then finished many minutes behind, for Mas the 110th Tour of France ended there. The Spaniard retired and appeared to have injured his shoulder.

While Adam Yates, in addition to the stage win and the yellow jersey, also scooped the green jersey of the best on points, Pogacar took the lead in the youngsters’ classification. The first mountain jersey went to the American Neilson Powless (EF Edcuation – EasyPost), who narrowly prevailed against Georg Zimmermann (Intermarché – Circus – Wanty) in the only mountain prize in the 2nd category with 27 kilometers to go.