It was hard work and everyone who came into question tried their best to get the Slovenian Tadej Pogacar into trouble, but in the end it was all for nothing: The Slovenian, who drives for the UAE team, also defended on the first extremely difficult stage in the Pyrenees on Sunday the lead in the overall standings of the Tour de France in an impressive way.

With the victory of the American Sepp Kuss (Team Jumbo-Visma), who prevailed as a soloist in front of the 41-year-old Spanish old master Alejandro Valverde (Movistar), Pogacar countered every attack of his competitors with calm self-evident.

It was an exciting, exciting stage to watch.

As for the overall standings, there was a lot of fire, a lot of smoke, but also nothing.

The drivers behind Pogacar didn't lose much, didn't gain much, only one paid tribute to the track and the pace.

The Frenchman Guillaume Martin, who had moved up from ninth to second the day before, lost the positions he had gained.

From nine to two to nine.

Wilco Keldermann, the Dutch captain of the German Bora-hansgrohe team, showed a strong performance.

He crossed the finish line in Pogacar's group and improved to sixth in the Tour table thanks to Martin's relocation.

Pogacar's lead over second place, again occupied by the Colombian Rigoberto Uran (EF Education-Nippo), increased to 5:32 minutes.

The day before, the Dutchman Bauke Mollema had won the gallop in the Pyrenees.

It was a coup that he had meticulously prepared.

"I've studied the last sixty kilometers on Google Maps," he said.

Everyone had expected an attack on the last mountain, the steep Col de Saint-Louis, but Mollema attacked 25 kilometers earlier, where it made the most sense on Google Maps.

On Sunday, on the much more difficult 14th stage from Céret in northern French Catalonia to the Principality of Andorra, there was no chance of taking the competition by surprise with such an action.

The mountains were too high for that, the climbs too steep.

It wasn't the terrain of adventurers like Mollema, it was the terrain of mountain specialists.

Three peaks in the first category and one of the second with a total of 4500 meters of altitude promised a tough battle.

If not for the top in the overall standings, then for the first places behind.

Pogacar on his own

As is so often the case, there were two races in the race. In the breakaway group, which had already been found after the first climb, 32 drivers gambled for a big victory, including prominent names: Wout van Aert, Michael Woods, Vincenzo Nibali, Julian Alaphilippe, Alejandro Valverde, Nairo Quintana, Seb Kuss. Behind them in the field, first five, then seven, then ten minutes back, the professionals behind the man in yellow watched each other as they fight for the best places in the overall standings. Front and back it got serious 60 kilometers from the finish as the Port d'Envallra gradually piled up in front of the riders, 2400 meters high and with a bad ramp on the last kilometers before the summit - the first executioner of this stage, the leading group mercilessly divided. Nairo Quintana, the altitude-tested Colombian climbing specialist,pulled away and won the mountain classification, but was overtaken again in the descent.

Four drivers from the British Ineos team finally turned the pace up and up, and it became very clear again that Pogacar does not have a competitive team in the mountains. Not a single one of his colleagues was by his side. Now everyone was driving against him, all against one. A perfect situation to drive the Slovenian out of the yellow jersey. But Pogacar is his own team. The locomotive that Ineos had harnessed to the group drove full steam towards the last mountain, but Pogacar didn't seem to care. He was fifth and the Ineos pacemakers' hopes that their captain Richard Carapaz could get Pogacar in trouble on the final climb failed.

On the ramps of the Col de Beixalis, everyone who was still in question tried to outrun the Slovenes: Carapaz, who was now on his own, the Dane Vingeggard, O'Connor, Quintana.

Pogacar ironed out any attempt without changing a face.

It was a show of force.

On this Monday, the Tour de France is taking a day off, rest day, time to take a breather.

Then it goes on in rapid succession.

There are three more mountain stages in the Pyrenees ahead of the riders, the most difficult on Thursday with the crossing of the legendary Tourmalet.

For the competition that means they still have three chances to bring Pogacar to their knees.

On Sunday it didn't look like she could do it.