Tour de France 2025 Stage 20 recap - Tadej Pogacar on brink of overall victory as Kaden Groves wins sodden penultimate stage from the breakaway

It’s Frenchman Louis Barre (Intermarche-Wanty) who steals a march over the pack to pocket the 2pts over the top, with Ivan Romeo (Movistar) in second place. That means no one can now catch Pogacar in the KOM standings, so he will win his third polka dot jersey in Paris tomorrow along with the yellow jersey.

Before the summit, it was the usual suspects pushing on the front – the likes of Michael Storer, Marc Hirschi and Luke Plapp all doing their best to get a gap and force a break.

That dig from Wellens sounded the death knell for the trio ahead. They have been pegged back and it’s then Visma who take it up with Wout van Aert showing his hand. The peloton strings out – and they still have around 2.5km of this climb to go.

Tim Wellens is the latest rider to power clear, the Belgian champion in hot pursuit of the leading trio around 10 seconds up the road. It looks like the breakaway will form not on this climb, but on the next climb or the lumpy plateau that follows.

We have a new trio out ahead and it includes EF duo Harry Sweeny and Nielson Powless. They’re joined by Raul Garcia Pierna of Arkea-B&B Hotels, who has had a very active Tour. The trio has 15 seconds on the pack as the rain continues to lash down. This is the worst rain we’ve seen throughout the race – it’s horrific. And no one will be feeling it more than Arnaud De Lie, who is in a world of pain off the back right now, battling to try and join the green jersey gruppetto.

The rain pours on the peloton, which has caught Asgreen and is now all strung out with Thibau Nys of Lidl and Harry Sweeny of EF on the front. There’s a green jersey group 50 seconds back, while De Lie is almost two minutes in arrears alongside a Lotto team-mate trying to pace him to Paris.

Asgreen, who already looks knackered, starts the Cat.3 Col de la Croix de la Serra, which is 12.1km at 4.1%. There’s a fair bit of movement behind, with Ben Healy pushing on the front and being marked by his top 10 rival Kevin Vauquelin of Arkea. You sense that it’s all about to kick off.

Asgreen has a small gap of 25 seconds as he goes over a small hill just ahead of the climb. Behind, Arnaud De Lie has already been distanced for Lotto, while Fred Wright has taken things up on the front of the pack for Bahrain Victorious.

A dicey moment as Asgreen comes round a corner and is faced with lots of debris on the road from a tree, which must have fallen overnight – or even quite recently. It’s been moved to the side of the road, but it’s still left its mark.

The lone ranger has 35 seconds over the peloton, which is rampaging along as one on this fast downhill approach to the first classified climb, which is coming right up. It’s likely that the real battle for the break will play out on the climb – and perhaps beyond.

The Dane’s Irish team-mate Ben Healy is in a trio behind alongside some other familiar faces: Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X) and Mauro Schmid (Jayco-AlUla). Raul Garcia Pierna (Arkea-B&B Hotels) is trying to join the trio, but the gaps are very small.

And there’s an attack from the outset from Kasper Asgreen of EF Education-EasyPost. The road goes uphill from the outset, and the Dane has a group of eight in pursuit, and then the front of the peloton – all strung out – digging in behind.

The riders are in the neutral zone and heading towards Kilometre Zero. Time to peer into your crystal ball and predict the day's winner...

Bahrain-Victorious are one of the 14 teams without success so far in this Tour. Our roving reporter slash man on the moto, Adam Blythe, caught up with Fred Wright and Matej Mohoric this morning…

Fred Wright: "First part of the plan is to get both of us in the breakaway. That would be a nice start. There’s a 12km climb at the start but it’s nice and steady and I think we could both get in the break."

Matej Mohoric: "I think most of the peloton will want to be in the breakaway today. Obviously not all of them will have the position or legs to be there, but I still expect a sizable breakaway to form. Maybe. But Fred says he wants to win his first international bike race. He’s won a race before, but apparently there were only 10 people at the startline, so…"

Asked who they would put their money on – excluding themselves – to win the stage, Fred said: "I think Quinn Simmons [below] is the man to watch. But he may have shot himself in the foot by showing how strong he is. That 3km climb [the Cote de Thesy with 60km to go] – we both know we’re going to have to kill ourselves to get over it to be there in the final."

Mohoric: "My parents taught be not to bet, so I will keep my money…"

"Obviously, I feel tired. It’s been tough mountain stages, the weather, long transfers. We’re looking forward to getting to Paris. For sure, I’ll try to be in the breakaway today. Tomorrow is a chance, but you can’t miss an opportunity here in the Tour de France. But breakaway days have climbers in the moves and that will make it difficult."

It’s easier to name those who have won than those who haven’t, so that’s what I’ll do. UAE Team Emirates-XRG, Visma-Lease a Bike, Soudal Quick-Step, EF Education-EasyPost, Ineos Grenadiers, Lidl-Trek, Alpecin-Deceuninck, Jayco-AlUla and Uno-X Mobility are the only teams with at least one win in this race.

The likes of Bahrain, Groupama, IPT, Movistar and Tudor will be very, very keen to get into the breakaway. But I feel the likes of Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek), Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike), Ben Healy (EF), Luke Plapp (Jayco), Michael Storer (Tudor Pro Cycling) and Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X) – the usual suspects – will be champing at the bit.

There's also the small matter of Geraint Thomas's penultimate Tour stage before retirement...

One of the most thrilling subplots of this final week has been the battle for the white jersey and the final spot on the podium. It’s a battle which came down to just 22 seconds ahead of yesterday’s stage, although come La Plagne, it looked like the young German Florian Lipowitz had come out on top of his Scottish counterpart Oscar Onley, who lost over 40 seconds on the final ascent. The gap between then is 1’03" and so, unless Lipowitz has a shocker today, he should win the white jersey and take the third spot on the podium in Paris tomorrow to cap a fine debut Tour.

Jonas Vingegaard will wear the polka dot jersey again today by default but it’s his big rival Pogacar who leads the KOM standings by 13pts. With a maximum total of just 14pts remaining, you could say that Pogacar was more likely to lose the yellow jersey at this stage than is he the polka dot jersey – because there’s no way the Dane will go over all but one of the remaining climbs in pole position.

Baring incident, Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) will win the coveted green jersey in Paris tomorrow after a 1successful maiden Tour de France. The Italian has won two stages but benefited from Tadej Pogacar not winning more stages this week, plus the withdrawals of Alpecin duo Mathieu van der Poel and Jasper Philipsen. Still, you have to be in it to win it, as they say.

1. Jonathan Milan 352pts
2. Tadej Pogacar 272pts
3. Biniam Girmay 213pts
4. Jonas Vingegaard 182pts
5. Anthony Turgis 169pts

That said, even if Pogacar had won in Superbagneres, Mont Ventoux, Col de la Loze and La Plagne, he would have only picked up an extra 32pts, which would have put him on 303 points – still 49pts shy of Milan’s tally. So it’s not as if the Italian was gifted the green jersey.

It looks like Milan is heading into these final two stages with a pretty slick green Trek, too...

Primoz Roglic came in almost 13 minutes down after going for broke yesterday, so he was the big casualty in the top 10, dropping three places to eighth as Felix Gall rose into the top five and Florian Lipowitz all but secured his spot on the podium.

Over 34 minutes separate the top 10, which sounds a lot, but it's actually only the biggest gap since 2022 when 35’59" separated Jonas Vingegaard and 10th place Valentin Madouas.

1. Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG)
2. Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) +4:24
3. Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe) +11:09
4. Oscar Onley (Picnic PostNL) +12:12
5. Felix Gall (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) +17:12
6. Tobias Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) +20:14
7. Kevin Vauquelin (Arkea-B&B Hotels) +22:35
8. Primoz Roglic (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe) +25:30
9. Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) +28:02
10. Ben O’Connor (Jayco-AlUla) +34:34

There’s been a growing trend to eschew a massive summit finish in the high mountains on the penultimate stage of the Tour in recent years.

After three time trials in succession, we had Pogacar’s win in the Vosges in 2023 and his victory on the Col de la Couillole in the Alpes Maritimes in 2024.

In fact, you have to go back to Vincenzo Nibali’s win at Val Thorens six years ago for a proper mountain showdown – and that was shortened to 60km on account of landslides.

This year’s final GC showdown plays out in the Jura on a route that is more ambush and breakaway territory than a battleground for yellow.

There may only be four lower-category climbs on the agenda, but the road is relentlessly up-and-down, with 2,900m of climbing before a somewhat subdued flat run into Pontarlier.

Time will tell if the gamble pays off – on paper, it looks like an intriguing stage that could light up the second week of a Tour, but perhaps not Stage 20.

The drama could be huge as riders battle to save their Tour, but it is unlikely it will have a large bearing on the outcome of the race.

Yesterday, the human held out against the aliens. At least, that was how Thymen Arensman (Ineos Grenadiers) described the finale of the sodden and shortened Stage 19 as the plucky Dutchman held on for a second mountaintop win of the race by just two seconds over his extraterrestrial pursuers.

With yellow jersey Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirtaes-XRG) and the polka dot jersey Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) closing in after a series of attacks from the white jersey of Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe), Arensman had just enough left in the tank to add an Alpine win at La Plagne to his Pyrenean success at Superbagneres last weekend.

For the first time in the 112th edition of the Tour, Denmark’s Vingegaard finally got the better of his big rival Pogacar as he crossed the line for second place with the Slovenian race leader on his back wheel. Bonus seconds sees the two-time champion cut his deficit to a still considerable 4:24 ahead of today’s lumpy penultimate stage in the Jura.

"Everyone knows that Tadej and Jonas are the strongest in the world – they’re almost like aliens. And just as a human, I still want to try to beat them," an exhausted but content Arensman said after his victory. "I just can’t believe that I did beat them today. I tried to not look behind and go as fast as I could – and it was just enough. It’s crazy."

German youngster Lipowitz settled for fourth place but seemingly secured the white jersey and the final spot on the podium after his late accelerations saw the elastic snap for Oscar Onley (Picnic PostNL). The young Scot crossed the line over 40 seconds back and is now unlikely to improve on his nevertheless impressive fourth place in the overall standings.

Austria’s Felix Gall (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale), meanwhile, rose into the top five at the expense of Primoz Roglic (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe) after the Slovenian gambled big with an early bid to strike out in pursuit of a win on a stage that was shortened from 130km to just 93km due to a contagious cattle disease outbreak on the Col des Saisies, which was scrapped from the parcours.

Roglic was the big loser of the day, dropping to eighth in the standings after crossing the line the best part of 13 minutes down.

Before the 112th edition of the Tour de France finishes tomorrow with the new-look Paris finale, there’s the small matter of today’s undulating stage in the foothills of the Jura mountains. If the various battles for yellow, green, polka dots and – almost certainly – white are done and dusted, there could still be a bit of movement inside the top 10.

But, most importantly, there are many riders and teams still with nothing to show from this race – so we can expect a massive battle to make it into the breakaway on a day that it almost nailed on to see a move go the distance. Unless, of course, UAE and Tadej Pogacar are genuinely miffed by not having won a stage this week since Tim Wellens soloed to success in Carcassonne last Sunday.