Key Takeaways: Tour de France Stage 2

Breaking down how the second stage of the 2024 Tour de France was won & teased what could be a truly great GC battle

After smartly sniping his way into the early breakaway and deftly outclimbing his remaining rivals on the second ascent of the leg-breaking climb to the sanctuary of San Luca in Bologna, Italy, Kévin Vauquelin delivered his small Arkéa-B&B Hotels team a season-defining win and kept the completely unexpected French two-stage win streak alive. At the end of a day of controlled riding in the peloton behind, the 2024 Tour de France shot to life when Tadej Pogačar laid down a searing attack on the steep slopes of San Luca. Pogačar may have gone on to eventually take the race lead and time on most of his GC rivals, but the story of the day was that his move was immediately marked by Jonas Vingegaard, who looked every bit as unflappable as he did through his last two Tour de France victories appearing to suffer no ill effects from his recent crash and ensuing recovery.

When the dust settled, Pogačar and Vingegaard crossed the line twenty-one seconds ahead of most of their rival GC contenders. However, Remco Evenepoel and Richard Carapaz avoided time losses due to a hugely impressive late bridge effort between the two groups, setting the stage for a potentially more competitive than expected Tour de France.

Stage Top Five:
1) Kévin Vauquelin (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) +0
2) Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X Mobility) +36
3) Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ) +49
4) Cristián Rodríguez (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) +49
5) Harold Tejada (Astana Qazaqstan) +49

Current GC Top Five:
1) Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) +0
2) Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) +0
3) Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) +0
4) Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) +0
5) Romain Bardet (dsm-firmenich PostNL) +6

Select GC Contenders Gained(+)/Lost(-) On the Stage:
Pogačar +0
Vingegaard -0
Evenepoel -0
Roglič -21
Rodríguez -21
Mas -21
Carapaz- 21
Ayuso -21
Joregenson -21
Almeida -21

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Stage 2 Race Notebook

BTP is seamlessly following every twist and turn of the 2024 Tour de France with the fantastic Tour Tracker app (iPhone/Android/Web)

192.3km: Less than 10kms into the stage, a move rolls clear with a collection of incredibly strong riders like Jonas Abrahamsen and Kévin Vauquelin.

192.2km: With the peloton wanting a move without any GC threats to form as quickly as possible, it is obvious this will stick. This means there is limited time to bridge up before the gap becomes impossible to ride across. Smartly, Vauquelin’s Arkea teammate Cristián Rodríguez jumps onto the back of one of the last trains’ across. This means Arkea is the only team with two riders in the group, giving them a massive advantage over the others.

93.5km: With the peloton rapidly eating into the breakaway’s gap, taking it from nine minutes down to five, a collection of key riders from Ineos and Visma, including Wout van Aert, crash after getting tangled up near the back of the bunch. This causes the pace to come off the front while Visma sits up to allow Jorgenson and Van Aert to receive medical attention and sees the time gap go back up to close to ten minutes, which ensures they will contest the stage win.

31.6km: When the peloton hits the first of two passes of the brutal San Luca climb in Bologna, Van Aert is setting a hard pace to keep Vingegaard at the front and allow him to save a significant amount of energy fighting for position. In addition to showing how strong and technically skilled they are, it shows just how confident the team is in Vingegaard right now.

21.2km: Between the first and second climbs of San Luca, Vauquelin, the strongest climber in the group, is at his most vulnerable. This is when the presence of his second teammate is critical since it allows him to follow attacks from the most dangerous riders, while Rodríguez sits in the wheels behind, which deters a serious chase effort.

14.3km: Once the three leaders hit the final climb, Vauquelin stays in the saddle and rides clear of the other two, pulling out a gap of close to a minute in the remaining part of the climb. With such a large gap on the chasers and just under three minutes on the peloton, Vauquelin has the win sealed and rides to the finish line for a massive stage victory.

11.5km: When the peloton hits the second pass of San Luca, due to UAE riders João Almeida and Juan Ayuso struggling with positioning, Pogačar only has one rider, Adam Yates, to ride a hard pace to set up an attack.

11.2km: Even with just Yates, the pace is still high enough to do serious damage, with the race leader and a large collection of GC contenders, including Primož Roglič and the two key UAE riders, Juan Ayuso and João Almeida, dropped from the elite group.

10.7km: When Pogačar unleashes a brutal acceleration near the top of the climb, Jonas Vingegaard responds without missing a beat while the rest of the field barely attempts to react. While the gradient is still 10%, it is significantly less steep than the previous sections.

10.6km: Pogačar quickly runs out of steep road, which allows Vingegaard to slot into his slipstream and get a not-insignificant draft. Behind, Richard Carapaz is the only rider who attempts to bridge across.

10.3km: When the gradients kick up toward the end, Vingegaard is able to match Pogačar’s pace.

10km: Somewhat shockingly, and in direct contrast to what he did in the same situation on Stage 1 of last year’s Tour, Vingegaard pulls through to work with Pogačar over the top of the climb.

600m: Inside the final km, Vingegaard stops working with Pogačar, which allows a fast-chasing Evenepoel and Carapaz to make up a significant amount of time.

200m: When Evenpoel and Carapaz make contact with the group, Pogačar, realizing he won’t take time on either Vingegaard or Evenepoel, goes to the other side of the road to push the others through and attempt to avoid taking the race lead.

Finish: Over two minutes behind the stage winner Vauquelin, Carapaz sprints for the finish line and a chance at the race lead; Pogačar sits up in an attempt to finish last in the group and potentially even a second behind to burden either Evenepoel or Vingegaard with the responsibilities of the race lead to no avail. Primož Roglič and the rest of the major GC contenders come home 21 seconds later, licking their wounds and likely worrying about the climb of the Galibier on Stage 4.

Three Key Takeaways