In the melee after the finish line, Tadej Pogačar burst through a bubble of journalists, photographers and camera crews. "Guys, please," he pleaded, pushing them aside. The Slovenian wanted to get to his teammates, Juan Ayuso and João Almeida, his two mountain lieutenants, who teed up his stage-winning attack 800m from the summit of the Col du Galibier .
When Pogačar reached them, he pulled them into an embrace. It was hard to hear what he told them exactly, his voice drowned out by the clicking of camera shutters, but their smiles told the story. Only four days in, on the biggest mountain day yet at the Tour de France , UAE Team Emirates lit the fuse on the general classification.
Pogačar, the man in control of the detonator, claimed 35 seconds from the rubble.
"It was the plan from the beginning, from the first stage, to take some time on the other guys on GC with Tadej," said his teammate Pavel Sivakov at the line in Valloire. "I think we did a perfect job. Even with the headwind, we managed to hurt everyone, and it's super-nice."
The wind roared down the south-western ascent of the Galibier on Tuesday afternoon. Given the conditions, UAE Team Emirates left it "a little bit later than planned", Sivakov explained, but when the summit approached, over 2,600m in the sky, the moment came for Pogačar to writhe away. Jonas Vingegaard followed, before he couldn't any longer.
The metres stretched out, so did the seconds, and over the climb's crest, Pogačar banked 10 seconds, which he tripled on the descent to the line.
It was a scene not dissimilar to one two year's prior at the race. That day, on the same Alpine slopes, Vingegaard's then-called Jumbo-Visma isolated Pogačar, leaving him floundering under attack. This time, the roles were reversed, and it was Vingegaard chasing the losses.
"To ride on the front, you need to have big balls like we did today," said Pogačar, dressed in yellow in his post-race press conference. "Hats off to the whole team. For sure, we showed today that we have one of the strongest teams here. To ride like we did today, it's crazy. We did a super-amazing job. We need to continue like this and be happy."
Some wondered if there had been a tiff between Pogačar and Almeida, when, with 3km to go on the Galibier, the duo appeared to shout at each other on their team radios. "You know when you go full gas, even if you just want to say to one of the guys, 'I love you', you need to shout," Pogačar said, clearing up any confusion.
The rest of the team were vocal about their love after the stage, too. "We've become a super-strong team," said Adam Yates, "and we showed it today. Not just the climbers, but Nils Politt controlled the entire day. He's a monster. It's the guys working on the flat, getting bottles. It was a really good day for the team."
Ayuso, third on the day and instrumental in support, went a step further in his praise. "It means so much to be in a team like this, to be in the best team in the world," he said, one led by perhaps the best rider in the world, too.
"[Pogačar] always asks more of us on the radio, because he expects us to have as good legs as him," Ayuso continued. In the end, the hard work earned the Spaniard a front row seat to the finale, one orchestrated by Pogačar, but constructed by his teammates.
"You just have to see it," Ayuso said of the attack. "It's incredible."
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