Stage 2

The road

At the start

Three walls into Boulogne

Jasper Philipsen wears the first yellow jersey, four seconds up on Biniam Girmay, and Alpecin have both the maillot jaune and Mathieu van der Poel. Filippo Ganna and Stefan Bissegger are already gone, both down on the road to Lille. Today is not for the sprinters: three short, steep côtes are stacked into the last fifteen kilometres, and the jersey could change shoulders on any of them.

How it was won

1. 113 km to go

   The Boulogne walls

   The finale into Boulogne-sur-Mer stacks three sharp cotes into the last 15km, shredding the bunch with every ramp until only the strongest punchers are left.

2. 21 km to go

   Van der Poel jumps

   On the final wall Mathieu van der Poel throws everything into a long sprint. Tadej Pogačar latches onto his wheel and the two great rivals drag each other toward the line, neither giving an inch.

3. 3At the line

   VdP holds on

   Van der Poel holds off Pogačar by a bike length in Boulogne to take the stage and the yellow jersey.

The result