Evenepoel is on a roll
The world time trial champion led at every intermediate time check and finished 28 seconds in front of the four-time Tour winner, with Mathias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek) coming third at 1:04. Evenepoel had an average speed of 48.458 km/h for the 26.1 km course, a remarkable pace considering he had to overcome a Category 2 climb (9.6 km @ 4.2%) on the first half of the stage.
French fans also had lots to cheer about as their 19-year-old hope Paul Seixas finished fourth in the stage, 1:16 adrift, and gained 5 seconds on the young UAE Team Emirates–XRG rider Isaac del Toro in the battle for the podium and the white jersey for the best young rider. He now trails the Mexican by 20 seconds.
But this was Evenepoel’s triumph from start to finish, and he was evidently delighted. “It was a very nice TT with a lot of people on the side of the road,” he said. “My whole family from both sides are here. My parents came here just today and my wife and her parents and her siblings as well.”
Tuesday was a Belgian national holiday, the equivalent of France’s Bastille Day, and Evenepoel’s victory was the first Tour stage win by a Belgian on the holiday since 1985. “On Belgium national day, it’s pretty special as well [to win],” Evenepoel noted. “I read this morning it’s been a while since a Belgian won on Belgian national day, so I’m proud to be the one.”
The two stages had something else in common besides the same 1-2 finish: a rider from the GC top 5 crashed out on each stage. On Sunday it was second-place Jonas Vingegaard; on Tuesday it was Evenepoel’s Red Bull–BORA–hansgrohe teammate Florian Lipowitz, who misjudged a corner and crashed heavily. Like Vingegaard, he also broke his right collarbone. It could have been worse. Not long after Lipowitz went down, Pogačar briefly lost control of his bike in the same spot, but managed to right himself.
“I’ve just been told my teammate Lipowitz crashed, so it’s a bittersweet pill to swallow,” Evenepoel said. “I will really miss him for the last week.” This is certainly true. With the question of team leadership settled on Sunday, Lipowitz would have been an invaluable domestique on the brutal climbs to come.
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Philipsen, finally
I could describe the plot of a thick Russian novel more easily than telling you what happened on the 174.7 km course from Chambéry to Voiron of Wednesday’s stage 17. Basically, it concluded with a huge non-bunch-sprint victory by Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin–Premier Tech), after a typically take-no-prisoners lead-out by Mathieu van der Poel, and ended weeks of frustration for Philipsen, who had received similar lead-outs from his superstar teammate in earlier stages but just didn’t fire.
He has now won a stage in five consecutive Tours and was of course relieved. “After such a roller-coaster of emotions on this Tour de France, I had to wait until stage 17,” he said afterwards. “I prepared very, very well and was in the shape of my life. The first 12 days were just horrible. I couldn’t find myself; I couldn’t find the feeling I was hoping for.
“After 17 stages, to take the victory is really one for the team. They keep on believing in me. I just want to thank everybody. I’ve been like an angry bird at the [dinner] table. I was just disappointed in myself and angry that I couldn’t take a stage win […] and the team had to deal with it.”
He went on to say that “this victory cost me a few years of my life. I was fighting somewhere in the middle, between groups, and I thought the stage was lost. […] We tried to make a plan, and in the end, they were super strong, the guys. They really delivered me to the finish line.”
The stage was designed for chaos, with four categorised climbs in the first 60 km and the intermediate sprint located about 25 km from the finish line, and with the race for the green jersey still in the balance. The madness was largely the result of breakaway riders battling with sprinters for the right to win the stage. Points classification leader Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) exploded the race when he led a small breakaway to the intermediate sprint, where he took 25 points. Philipsen, riding in the group behind him, picked up 9 points.
While all this was happening, there were at least four groups of riders on the road. That shrank to three and ended with 43 riders chasing one, Jasper Stuyven (Soudal Quick-Step). He had a lead of 47 seconds with 15 km left to ride, with the peloton more than 6 minutes behind and well out of the fray. Stuyven had helped Magnier win three stages at the Giro and led out Tim Merlier to three stage wins in this Tour, but he had not won a race in five years – and he was no match for the sprinters’ teams chasing him.
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Eventually, with 200 metres left to ride, van der Poel rocketed down the finishing straight, and Philipsen roared out of his shadow to beat second-place Mauro Schmid (Jayco AlUla) – who is not a sprinter – by about 5 metres. Olav Kooij (Decathlon CMA CGM), who is a sprinter, finished third.
The effort Pedersen made to win the points at the intermediate sprint had taken its toll on him, and he could finish no better than eighth in the final sprint. That gave him only 10 points, compared to the 50 Philipsen received for the stage win, and reduced his lead over Philipsen in the race for the green jersey to a mere 7 points.
Pedersen again & UAE worries
There was more breakaway madness on Thursday’s stage 18, but this time it was pure breakaway madness, without sprinters, because of the 3,900 metres of climbing on the route.
No, I lied; one sprinter was involved. Who else but the irrepressible, indefatigable Pedersen, who climbed all the mountains and hills of 130 km of the 185.2 km course from Voiron to the ski resort of Orcières-Merlette, to again take 25 points at the intermediate sprint and increase his lead in the points classification to 32 points over Philipsen. There is no rider in the peloton who does – or even wants to do – what Pedersen does: climb, go all out in breakaways, then sprint.
Again, there were about four or five dozen riders in various breakaways during the stage, while the GC riders decided, after a while, to kick back and save their legs for the two huge Alpe d’Huez stages coming up on Friday and Saturday. Long story short, eventually a six-rider group kept away all chasers and headed up the final climb to a summit finish at Orcières-Merlette (7.1 km @ 6.7%) to decide the winner.
Richard Carapaz (EF Education–EasyPost) left his fellow travellers no chance. He attacked with 3.4 kmleft to ride and no one lifted a pedal in pursuit. He won his second Tour stage and the ninth Grand Tour stage of his career, the most of any South American cyclist, beating Jayco AlUla’s Schmid by 45 seconds. That gives the Swiss rider one stage win and two second places on this Tour. Matteo Jorgenson (Visma–Lease a Bike) finished third, with the same time.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about this stage during the Tour; I felt certain that it was one that suited me, and when I felt I had the legs this morning, I decided to really go for it,” the winner said afterwards. “The final climb wasn’t great for me, to be honest, but I had the legs, and that was what mattered.”
But the stage also revealed a potentially serious situation at UAE Team Emirates–XRG that could spell trouble for Pogačar. Adam Yates rode stages 17 and 18 with a stomach bug that has slowed him down significantly; he finished 162nd (of 164 riders) on Wednesday and 102nd on Thursday. On Thursday, another important support rider, Brandon McNulty, abandoned the race due to illness, and Tim Wellens, also a vital domestique, finished last, also slowed by illness. Both were reportedly suffering from sore throats. On top of that, Florian Vermeersch told Sporza after finishing 113th on Thursday that he was “suffering with a bit of an injury that is holding me back.”
All that is not great news with the two hardest stages of the Tour still to race. But Pogačar is not worried. “Felix [Grossschartner] is riding super well, Nils [Politt] also, Isaac [Del Toro] is amazing,” he said. “Adam is getting better, Tim also. If I put a bit of motivation on him, then he always grabs it and goes through all the pain. Florian [Vermeersch] can be helpful from the start.”
It’s rare that any UAE squad riding in a Grand Tour encounters so many issues beyond its control. If these issues aren’t resolved, we will see just how much the four-time Tour champion relies on his domestiques and if the yellow jersey is indeed as done and dusted as it appears to be.
Results 2026 Tour de France 2026 stage 18: Voiron to Orcières-Merlette (185.2 km)
- Richard Carapaz, EF Education–EasyPost 4:26:21
- Mauro Schmid, Jayco AlUla +0:45
- Matteo Jorgenson, Visma–Lease a Bike “
- Valentin Paret-Peintre, Soudal Quick-Step +1:14
- Tobias Halland Johannessen, Uno-X Mobility +1:57
- Raúl García Pierna, Movistar +2:12
- Pablo Castrillo, Movistar +4:30
- Lenny Martinez, Bahrain Victorious +4:35
- Remco Evenepoel, Red Bull–BORA–hansgrohe “
- Tom Pidcock, Pinarello Q36.5 “
Tour de France 2026 General Classification After Stage 18
- Tadej Pogačar, UAE Team Emirates–XRG 64:35:13
- Remco Evenepoel, Red Bull–BORA–hansgrohe +4:32
- Isaac del Toro, UAE Team Emirates–XRG +6:51
- Paul Seixas, Decathlon CMA CGM +7:11
- Juan Ayuso, Lidl-Trek +9:22
- Mattias Skjelmose, Lidl-Trek +10:14
- Lenny Martinez, Bahrain Victorious +12:50
- Tom Pidcock, Pinarello Q36.5 +12:58
- Jordan Jegat, TotalEnergies +14:04
- Richard Carapaz, EF Education–EasyPost +21:00