Tour de France 2025 live: Stage 14 route updates today as Tadej Pogacar dominates standings – UK Times

84km to go: Martinez goes over the top of the Tourmalet with a lead of more than a minute over the chasing group – the young Frenchman zoomed up the final few kms! The home fans are loving this, although they can’t see much because the fog is so dense. Race organisers will be having a close look at whether this is still safe.

A huge shame – Remco Evenepoel has abandoned the race! It seems the Belgian has just been wiped out by illness on this Tour, and he’s done.

Mattias Skjelmose has also abandoned the race. He crashed and hurt his left arm, but initially got back on his bike before deciding he couldn’t go on.

96km to go: The leader, Lenny Martinez (Bahrain Victorious) leads the way, and he’s nearing the top of the Col du Tourmalet in misty, wet weather.

He’s being chased about 45sec behind by Sepp Kuss (Visma-Lease a Bike), Valentin Paret Peintre (Soudal-Quick Step), Thymen Arensman (Ineos Grenadiers), Carlos Rodríguez (Ineos Grenadiers), Michael Storer (Tudor), Ben O’Connor (Jayco-AlUla), Gregor Mühlberger, Einer Rubio (Movistar Team), Michael Woods (Israel-Premier Tech) and Tobias Johannessen (Uno-X).

And not far behind them are Simon Yates (Visma-Lease a Bike), Aleksandr Vlasov (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Emiel Vestrynge (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Enric Mas (Movistar Team), Sergio Higuita (XDS-Astana) and Jordan Jegat (TotalEnergies).

What’s left a splintered peloton is a further minute back down the mountain.

The first and most common climb in Tour de France history is can be ‘make or break’, former Ineos Grenadiers’ road captain Luke Rowe tells The Independent.

“Super happy, this time trial was quite a big question mark already in December for me,” stage 13 winner Pogacar said. “I wanted everything to be perfect and the team delivered. I started the day good, had an easy day in the morning, nice preparation and I was really targeting to do from start to finish all out and try to smash as much as possible on the pedals. I almost blew up in the end but I saw the timer on the top and it gave me an extra push because I saw that I’m gonna win.

“This was the biggest decision to make, which bike today. Obviously we’re racing on road bikes most of the year, 99% of the time, so in the end we did calculations and I decided to be more comfortable, riding the last 12 stages on the same bike.”

110km to go: Our escaping trio featuring Geraint Thomas are caught just before the start of the Tourmalet climb, and they ride the famous ascent together – immediately there are splinters in the pack.

At the intermediate sprint at the foot of the climb, Jonathan Milan beats Mathieu van der Poel to maximum points to tighten his grip on the green jersey.

Remco Evenepoel, 11th on yesterday’s stage and still third overall but more than seven minutes down, said: “It was bad. With a normal feeling I should be in the top three on a day like this. I was really bad, [there is] no explanation.

“My start was good [but] five minutes in I wasn’t feeling good and couldn’t push the power. It was a very bad from me.”

120km to go: There have been a flurry of attempted breakaways in these opening kilometres, but none have stuck as the peloton reels them in one by one.

The latest to go is the trio of Geraint Thomas (Ineos Grenadiers), Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ) and Matteo Vercher (Total Energies). While I’d love to see Thomas go for the stage win today, you’d think he’s going to need some more firepower bridging across to join him if he’s to make a breakaway stick.

The trio have about 20 seconds on the peloton.

From Lapize’s fury in 1910, to Eddy Merckx’s dominant performances on the mountain in 1969 and 1974, to Bernard Hinault v Greg Lemond in 1986, and Thibaut Pinot’s emotional stage win in 2019 when the climb was used as a rare summit finish, the Tourmalet is steeped in historic moments. But Rowe has ridden alongside the yellow jersey on the Tourmalet stage before, and he advises caution.

“I think the best way to stamp his authority is cross the finish line first, not attack on a certain climb because it’s got an iconic name,” says Rowe. “If I’m UAE, then if Visma want to put the pressure on, just let them ride. Just sit there. There’s only one guy from their team you’ve got to follow. Wait, wait, wait, and attack 3k from the finish line. There’s no reason to do more. You’ve got that gap – now it’s just about preservation.”

Tourmalet is just one part of a merciless stage 14 which also features the Col d’Aspin and Col de Peyresourde, all part of the series of mountain passes at the heart of the Pyrenees known dramatically as the ‘Circle of Death’. That trio is just the warm-up before the final 12.4km hors-categorie climb to the summit finish at Superbagneres.