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Wout Van Aert conquers Tour de France’s double climb of Ventoux

Vingegaard cracks rivals on the Giant of Provence, leaps onto podium

Photo by: Sirotti
July 7, 2021
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Wout Van Aert’s fourth Tour de France victory in three consecutive editions was a special one. On Wednesday he soloed away from his breakmates on the stage’s second climb of the Giant of Provence, the dreaded Mont Ventoux, to take the day’s prize, leap up to 13th in the GC and take over second spot in the mountains classification. Van Aert was second in Tuesday’s bunch sprint.

There was movement at the top of the GC, with Van Aert’s young Danish teammate Jonas Vindegaard dropping all his top-5 rivals including yellow jersey Pogačar to jump onto the podium. However, Pogačar now leads the race by 5:18 over Rigoberto Uran instead of 2:02 over Ben O’Connor. Rusty Woods was looking strong for the first two-thirds of the second assault of Ventoux and, with 20th place on the day, climbed his way into the top-30.

The Course

At nearly 200 km and with two assaults of the Giant of Provence, Mount Ventoux, Wednesday’s route was a formidable one. Riders had an appetizer of two Cat. 4s before Cat. 1 Côte de Gordes, which led almost immediately to the first, easier Cat. 1 ascent of bald topped, foreboding Ventoux (22.1 km of 5 percent). The second climb of Ventoux was from the classic side and was 25.7 km of 8.7 percent. The descent to Malaucène was the same 20 km drop as from the first climb.

Several attacks flared away soon after the depart in Sorgues. Julian Alaphilippe was part of something that stuck and bounced over Côte de Fontaine-de-Vaucluse and Côte de Gordes first. By the foot of Cat. 1 Col de la Liguière, his foursome was a minute ahead of a chase group of 13 containing Van Aert and 3:00 ahead of the peloton.

Of all the riders in the break and the chase, Anthony Perez (France/Cofidis) had the most King of the Mountain points–seven to classification leader Nairo Quintana’s 50. But it was Irishman Dan Martin (Israel Start-up Nation) who grabbed 10 at the top of Liguière.

Ventoux I

At the foot of the easier Ventoux climb, the chase reached the Alaphilippe quartet. Five minutes behind at the back of the peloton, 10th place David Gaudu was sick on his bike and the polka dot jersey Quintana was distanced. Alaphilippe attacked to streamline the breakaway and then crested first.

Ventoux II

The Alaphilippe-Van Aert breakaway hit the foot of the harder side of Ventoux with a 4:30 lead on the peloton. There were three Trek-Segafredo riders in the octet, and they were thinking about Bauke Mollema’s prospects. Trek sent Kenny Elissonde on the attack.

Van Aert bridged over to Elissonde. Mollema dropped Alaphilippe in the attempt to reach the leading duo.

In the peloton, Ineos’ pace was thinning out the numbers. With 11 km to climb, Michael Woods was still there.

Woods was still in the yellow jersey group as second place Ben O’Connor began to crack.

Van Aert then went solo.

Second place Ben O’Connor, winner of Stage 9, was the next to break in the yellow jersey group. It seemed with a 3:17 gap back his closest podium rival he was safe, but he cracked mightily.

The moonscape reappeared. Van Aert’s lead was growing.

With 2.8 km to climb, Woods finally submitted to the pace of the group. Pogačar lost his last teammate. Eight fellows remained before Enric Mas and Michal Kwiatkowski fell away. After Uran moved to the front of the group, Vingegaard attacked. Pogačar grabbed his wheel. Richard Carapaz and Uran couldn’t hang.

Vingegaard then bolted on Pogačar, who admitted that he cracked a little. The Dane crested 38 seconds ahead of Pogačar and close behind the Trek duo. On the descent Carapaz, Uran and Pogačar hunted down one Jumbo-Visma man, but another fellow in the same kit raised his arms in victory 1:38 ahead of the elite foursome.

Jonas Vingegaard climbed away from his rivals on Mont Ventoux.

O’Connor dropped to fifth, while Wilco Kelderman and Alexey Lutsenko, who only lost 18-seconds to the Pogačar foursome, jumped up to sixth and seventh respectively as the expense of Mas.

Thursday’s 160 km stage is full of little unclassified climbs.


2021 Tour de France Stage 11
1) Wout Van Aert (Belgium/Jumbo-Visma) 5:17:43
2) Kenny Elissonde (France/Trek-Segafredo) +1:14
3) Bauke Mollema (The Netherlands/Trek-Segafredo) s.t.
20) Michael Woods (Canada/Israel Start-up Nation) +7:34
53) Hugo Houle (Canada/Astana-Premier Tech) +24:38
101) Guillaume Boivin (Canada/Israel Start-up Nation) +31:09

2021 Tour de France GC
1) Tadej Pogačar (Slovenia/UAE-Emirates) 43:44:38
2) Rigoberto Uran (Colombia/EF Education-Nippo) +5:18
3) Jonas Vingegaard (Denmark/Jumbo-Visma) +5:32
4) Richard Carapaz (Ecuador/Ineos Grenadiers) +5:33
5) Ben O’Connor (Australia/AG2R-Citroën) +5:58
6) Wilco Kelderman (The Netherlands/Bora-Hansgrohe) +6:16
7) Alexey Lutsenko (Kazakhstan/Astana-Premier Tech) +6:30
8) Enric Mas (Spain/Movistar) +7:11
9) Guillaume Martin (France/Cofidis) +9:29
10) Pello Bilbao (Spain/Bahrain-Victorious) +1);28
28) Michael Woods (Canada/Israel Start-up Nation) +57:00
55) Hugo Houle (Canada/Astana-Premier Tech) +1:25:32
95) Guillaume Boivin (Canada/Israel Start-up Nation) +1:52:09