Unpredictability, improvisation and "very good" tandem Pogacar-Yates: This is how UAE dealt a huge blow to Visma in the Pyrenees

Tadej Pogacar did an excellent job in the first of two Pyrenean stages in the Tour de France. The yellow jersey wearer won the fourteenth stage with arrival at Pla d'Adet and picked up 39 seconds and four bonuses over his big rival Jonas Vingegaard. Afterwards, Pogacar showered praise on his teammates, who laid the groundwork for their leader's victory.

"This was on instinct," Pogacar said about his victory in the flash interview. "We wanted to go for the stage win, but more from the sprint," he was referring to the team's tactics during stage 11. Then Pogacar chose to attack from afar, which ended up costing him dearly. This time the Slovenian waited longer and involved teammate Adam Yates in his plan. "A situation arose where Adam could attack, forcing Visma | Lease a Bike to control. If I could jump to Adam, he could ride in front for a while. I have to thank the whole team today, they were really fantastic. This victory is for them," Pogacar praised his team.

After a strong group broke away, following an already seething opening stage, UAE Team Emirates immediately took the initiative. All teammates came to the fore. In particular, Nils Politt went all out at the front, both on the flat and uphill. "The plan was really to make the finale hard and sprint for the stage win, and maybe take some time in that way. However, this is much better. This is very good news and I am super happy to be in this position. Let's keep the momentum with the team and defend this position," said the yellow jersey, who now has almost two minutes (1.57 minutes, ed.) on Vingegaard in the general classification. Although Pogacar had already won 12 Tour stages before this, a stage win still means a lot to him. "Winning a Tour stage is always special. I could never have dreamed of that as a kid, but if you keep chasing your dreams, you can catch them."

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Super domestiques Almeida and Yates roll out the red carpet for Pogacar

Pogacar had his super domestiques João Almeida and Yates along on the final climb. The former did preparatory work by tiring the competition out with a high pace. Afterwards, the Portuguese rider spoke with Eurosport. "We wanted to ride a high pace and gain time on Vingegaard. In the end, we executed the plan perfectly. Compliments to the team for that. This was perfect teamwork," he proudly said. The fact that Yates would act as a springboard for Pogacar was not really the plan, Almeida said. "It was one of the options. It depended on the race. It worked out really well."

Not much later, Yates confirmed Almeida' words about the team's tactics. "It wasn't the intention initially, but I already told the other guys: with Tadej you never know what the plan is. He always feels good and today he was very good. At one point he told me to attack. I said what are you talking about? I then took off and occasionally looked back to see if he was already coming. I couldn't do much for him because I was already pretty cooked. However, I did what I could and we gained some time," Yates concluded, rightly very satisfied with the day's performance.

With Pogacar, Yates has an unpredictable leader, but for the British climber that is not a problem. "It's not a big deal. In the end, it's always a matter of going full throttle until you can't do any more. It's nice working together (with Pogacar, ed.). We already showed last year that we are a very good tandem." Pogacar's improvised tactics already proved effective. "Last time we tried from afar. Then it didn't work out well. Today, with a shorter attack, we chose a different tactic, but we took a lot more time. Tomorrow is another big day. The team is working well together, we will see what will happen," Yates seemed to anticipate another attacking race day for UAE Team Emirates.