Consensus is either Vingegaard or Pogacar will win it, which is is one reason why I tend to follow the polka-dot (climbing) jersey – at least there is some variation on that. Green (sprinting) also, but that doesn’t interest me as much.
Stage 1 Pogacar is THIRD, 12 seconds off Vingegaard, but that can be made up.
Brian
Thanks for starting this. I enjoy following it although I usually don’t have much to contribute.
I just watch the ~20 min NBC sports highlight reels, and check the official site for standings I didn’t catch or NBC didn’t mention.
Pogacar lets his teammate Del Toro get a stage win. Del Toro also has the green.
McNulty gets second in the Polka Dot just by leading Pogacar up a hill (twice, as it ended with a 3 lap loop)
The 2 point climb was average 9.x % (which I can slowly do), but portions were ~14% (I would have trouble, even in granny gear – maybe if it was short enough)
Brian
Great job by Baudin to get the polka dot – he also won the “most aggressive” award for this stage.
Pogacar and Vingegaard are TIED, but Pogacar wins the tiebreaker.
Brian
Mads Pedersen gets the stage win, with Quinn Simmons second. (QS is leading for white jersey) Another Quinn is second overall (interesting to me their initials are reversed). Somebody besides Pogacar or Vingegaard will wear yellow – overall it is Torstein Træen. P+V are ~8 min behind.
Brian
Veistroffer was ahead of the peloton all by himself for quite a while. Until the end the peloton stayed pretty much together. A crash just outside 5km mixed things up.
Træen stays in yellow, with Sean Quinn staying in second.
Baudin increases his lead in polka dot (only 2 then 1 point today – Veistroffer got the 2, Baudin got 1)
Pedersen increases his lead in green.
Brian
Pogi is too good, makes almost any race he’s in boring.
If he wants it, I don’t see anyone else getting the polka dot now – He cruised up that HC hill.
I guess I will follow the green and white, as they are what is in serious contention, though since Del Toro is the lead out for Pogacar, that may be set as well.
Brian
Stage 7 – mostly flat – Other than bonus, I think everyone got the same time. The only real competition was for sprint points / stage win. Pedersen still has the green, though his lead is less.
Brian
Stage 8 – another mostly flat stage - 2 category 4 (easiest) climbs.
I should know by now that one rider leading most of the race will rarely win. Slock was ahead ~179 of the 180 km, but ended up 114th (at least he got “combative”)
Pedersen’s lead in the Green (sprint) Jersey is a lot less – went from 59 to 15 points.
Brian
Pedersen’s more a classics guy than a bunch sprinter, so not terribly surprising to see him back a ways on these proper sprint finishes. Sprint at the end of a really hard, highly selective race? Mads is hard to beat. But in a flat grand tour stage? The pure sprinters will all trounce him, unless it was a crazy hard crosswind echelon race or something. To win the green he’ll be needing to score points that guys like Merlier can’t get to, like intermediate sprints in medium mountain stages and such. Which I’m sure has been his strategy all along. Without bothering to analyze the upcoming stages for green points, I’m guessing he’s still a comfortable favourite to be wearing green in Paris.
Stage 9 (July 12th) – I was away from computer so didn’t watch until today (the 13th – which is a rest day)*
Pedersen is now 45 points ahead for green.
Even though it doesn’t affect overall standings much, I do enjoy folks compete for KOM points.
USA folks near the top: S Quinn is 12th overall, S. Kuss is 20th, and B. McNulty is 25th
* I guess they made Bastille Day a non rest day so more folks can watch – but French folks only work about 100 days a year anyways 
Brian
The Guardian had an article today wondering if the dominance of Pogacar and UAE Team Emirates is negatively impacting interest in the race. I did think it was a little crappy how they chased down some breakaways of riders when it wasn’t going to impact the standings. Come, on, let some guy who has no chance at the podium at least get a stage victory.
In the stage 9 finish, the TV shot of the 4 leaders jockeying for position and delaying their sprint until 300 meters to go, with the peleton in the background looming behind and closing fast - man that’s good drama. How could those 4 be so calm with the wave about the crash, trusting in their ability to outsprint the field?
Yeah, how could Mathieu van der Poel be calm at the end of a race?
Winner
Ronde van Vlaanderen '20, '22, '24
Paris-Roubaix '23, '24, '25
Milan-Sanremo '23, '25
World Championship '23
Dozens of other less prestigious races. More podium finishes than you can shake a stick at.
A little high stakes tactical brinkmanship at the end of a grand tour stage is hardly anything new to him.
At this point, is there any realistic chance that Vingegaard (or anybody else) can come back or are we just watching the Pogacar show?
Obviously absent some horrific crash that takes P out.
Any rider can have a really bad day for no particular reason. See for example Simon Yates at the 2018 Giro when he was 3 minutes up on Froome and Dumoulin and completely blew up on Stage 19, losing 35 minutes.
Have a bad night’s sleep, mess up the fueling on a hard stage, whatever, if you bonk hard it can be really disastrous.
We really wouldn’t expect that, though. This is just the Pogi show. Jonas’ plan to have a double peak for both Giro and Tour clearly hasn’t panned out, because an in form Vingegaard finishes ahead of Remco et al on a stage like today. Should be an all out race for the lower podium steps, though.
Stage 10 (July 14, yesterday as I type this) - Carapaz gets some KOM points, and Baudin gets some as well, but as I said, if Pogacar wants them, he will likely get them.
Some shake up for white (youth) Ayuso is now leading though only by 46 seconds.
Pedersen is now 56 points ahead for Green.
Brian
Stage 11 – mostly flat. Not much to say other than a different stage winner (Waerenskjold). Anthon Charmig did get both KOM points – my understanding is that winning a KOM checkpoint is worth some $.
Actually there is something to say – this was the fastest average speed stage for the TdF in history (not including time trials) – 50.91 kph (~31.6 mph)
Brian
Stage 12 finish - Yikes!