[jyl]

Absent a bad crash or collapse or other calamity to Pogacar, the GC contest is over. 5 minutes on every conceivable rival and none of them look able to challenge or frankly even match him in future climby stages.

The stage 1 crashes screwed up the GC contest. Maybe Pogacar is simply on a different level to Roglic and Thomas anyway, he seems to be dominating all of the un-injured GC guys too, like Carapaz. But I don’t think the gap would be 5 minutes if the two GC rivals who can time trial were not walking wounded.

So now we watch the battle to get on the podium - Van Aert seems pretty determined, but can he really haul his non-climber heft through the Alps and Pyrénées without eventually blowing up?