Five kilometres from the summit
The first full-scale mountain day — Col d'Aspin, Col du Tourmalet, and the new 18.7 km summit finish above Gavarnie-Gèdre — needed no tactical subtlety, and it got none. Five kilometres below the top of the Tourmalet, Tadej Pogačar went. Nobody came with him.
Over the giant of the Pyrenees alone, down the other side alone, up the final climb alone. By the finish the gap to Jonas Vingegaard was 2 minutes 40 seconds, with Isaac del Toro third at 2:57. One attack, and the Tour had a new shape.
The fairy tale ends, the frame hardens
Torstein Træen's two days in yellow ended the way these stories usually do — the Norwegian was distanced long before the final climb and finished 51st, giving the jersey back to Pogačar. Del Toro's bonus seconds lifted him to third overall.
The GC after six stages: Pogačar, Vingegaard at 2:42, del Toro at 3:27. Numbers that would sit unchanged through the sprint stages to come — and numbers that suddenly looked very hard to move.
Profile and result on the stage 6 page — everything else on the Tour tracker.
