LONGWY, France-- Twice defending champion Tadej Pogacar stormed to victory in stage six of the Tour de France on Thursday with a late lung-busting effort and snatched the overall leader's yellow jersey from Wout van Aert.
It was the seventh Tour stage win for the Slovenian, who finished ahead of Michael Matthews and David Gaudu in the 220-km journey from Binche to Longwy, the longest in this year's race.
"Every time I win it is even better; the first two hours were so crazy, a lot of teams pulling in the peloton," said Pogacar.
"The team did an incredible job bringing me to the perfect position. It was not a pure sprint, it was hectic. I guess I had good legs. I am super happy to take the win, anything else is just a bonus."
The UAE Team Emirates rider benefited from 2020 runner-up Primoz Roglic, who dislocated his shoulder during the fifth stage, mistiming his sprint and sped away from his compatriot in the last few metres to take the win.
Pogacar leads American Neilson Powless by four seconds in the general classification with Jonas Vingegaard of Denmark 27 seconds further back in third.
Belgian Van Aert, flanked by Jakob Fuglsang and Quinn Simmons, led the breakaway and the Jumbo-Visma rider put on a remarkable show to open up a gap of two minutes before being swallowed by the peloton with 11km to go.
But the decision to attack the stage alone proved to be a costly miscalculation as an exhausted Van Aert slid down the peloton after being caught and lost his overall lead.
"That was the plan as soon as we saw Wout go in the breakaway -- we can let him burn himself and try to go for yellow at the end," said Powless of EF Education–EasyPost.
"The bonus seconds at the end took it away. Really disappointed we couldn't get yellow in the end, the whole team committed to it."
Friday's stage seven is a 176.5-km ride from Tomblaine to La Super Planche des Belles Filles.
