It was a day to remember for UAE Team Emirates-XRG as their Belgian rider Tim Wellens won the 15th stage of the Tour de France, even as star champion Tadej Pogacar retained the overall lead.
Wellens won a baking and hilly stage at the walled citadel of Carcassonne as his UAE teammate Pogacar remained ahead of the pack.
The 34-year-old Belgian champion Wellens has won stages on the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a Espana, while this was a fifth stage win on the 2025 Tour de France for UAE Team Emirates, Pogacar having already won four himself.
Wellens was in a four-man leading group with Michael Storer, Quinn Simmons and Victor Campeanaerts as they climbed the three kilometre incline Pas du Sant.
Carlos Rodriguez, Warren Barguil, Aleks Vlasov and Alexey Lutsenko were chasing, and Wellens waited for the trailing group to catch up before he attacked with 43.5km to go, knowing his rivals would find it hard to react with the downhill to come.
The Belgian rider finished one minute and 28 seconds ahead of Campeanaerts and 1:36 ahead of Julian Alaphilippe, Wout van Aert, and Axel Laurance.
Pogacar and his closest general classification rivals, Jonas Vingegaard and Florian Lipowitz, finished in a large group 6:07 behind Wellens.
Pogacar maintained his overall lead of 4:13 over Vingegard and 7:53 over German rider Lipowitz.
After a mass fall early on with Lipowitz and Vingegaard involved, the Pogacar group raced on, leaving two-time winner Vingegaard and a group of 30 riders to exhaust themselves catching up.
Pogacar, aiming for his fourth title in the iconic race, entered the Pyrenees on Thursday tucked in at second to surprise yellow jersey Ben Healy but emerged with two more stage wins and a four minutes advantage on top of the overall standings.
Monday is the final rest day before the 2025 edition soars into the Alps on Tuesday's stage 16 with the 15.8km ascent of Mont Ventoux at 7.9 per cent gradient to its 1901m high summit.
After the stage, Wellens celebrated a special win.
“It is a very special victory. Everyone knows the Tour de France and everyone wants to ride the Tour de France, and not many people win at the Tour de France, so it is a very beautiful victory,” said Wellens.
“I felt super good before the stage. Before the stage, Nils [Politt] and me were laughing a little bit that we would go in the break, suddenly there was a crash. I kept on attacking and followed one move, and I was in the breakaway,” Wellens said.
“On the climb, it exploded again, and then on the last climb of the day, I felt really good. I saw the others also felt good, but I knew I had to go solo. At the top of the climb, I knew I had my moment and had the legs to keep it until the end.”
