By Vincent Daheron
BARCELONA, July 4 (Reuters) – Jonas Vingegaard took an early lead in his quest for a third Tour de France title as the Visma-Lease a Bike rider recorded the fastest time in stage one – a 19.6-km team time trial in Barcelona on Saturday.
Last year’s runner-up Vingegaard, who won the race in 2022 and 2023, finished 12 seconds ahead of Slovenian rival Tadej Pogacar, who has won the Tour de France four times, including the last two editions.
Dane Vingegaard, 29, was expertly led out to the final hill by his teammates and led them to the finish line to take the yellow jersey for the first time in three years.
Pogacar was the third fastest on the day, with Italian Filippo Ganna finishing second as he took over the final charge of Netcompany-Ineos after teammate Kevin Vauquelin suffered a slow puncture.
“I would say it’s the perfect start. It’s still a long tour, obviously, but it’s the perfect start,” said Vingegaard, who also won the Vuelta a Espana last year and the Giro d’Italia in May.
“(My teammates) just drove me all the way to the finish. And to take the stage win for us and to take the yellow jersey, also for me personally, after a few years without it, a few hard years, it’s nice for me to experience it again.”
With teams starting at five-minute intervals, Alex Molenaar (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) was the first to cross the finish line. Jordan Jegat (Total Energies) improved the benchmark soon after, finishing 10 seconds faster.
French national road champion Romain Gregoire (Groupama-FDJ United) was the next to push the threshold, flying up the final hill to cross the finish line in 22 minutes and 28 seconds.
Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech) came in two seconds quicker than Gregoire in a solo finish but he was soon surpassed by Netcompany-Ineos, as Ganna sped to the finish in 21 minutes and 55 seconds.
Juan Ayuso tried to put Lidl-Trek in the lead, collapsing after crossing the finish line, but could only secure fourth place, 16 seconds behind the leader.
French prodigy Paul Seixas, making his Tour de France debut at 19 years old, finished in 10th place, 39 seconds behind Vingegaard.
“We expected to see time gaps like that, I think we put in a good performance today,” Seixas said.
The race continues in Spain on Sunday with a 169-km hilly ride from Tarragona to Barcelona.
(Reporting by Vincent Daheron; Writing by Chiranjit Ojha in Bengaluru; editing by Clare Fallon)
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