Wout van Aert says goodbye to yellow jersey after "mission impossible" breakaway

To have the yellow jersey attacking a race is unusual. To have it trying to make a breakaway at the Tour de France is extremely rare, but Wout van Aert rode all-out today in an attempt to disrupt the dominance that Tadej Pogacar has already asserted over the first five days of the race.

"I was not planning to hand over the yellow per se this morning. But the race just went surprisingly well," van Aert told Sporza. "It was not easy to participate in the break, because with your yellow jersey you naturally stand out. When we did have a gap, there were only 3 of us." Eventually this proved to be, despite a strong, a very small group that couldn't resist the chase of a breakaway despite the tailwind the riders had throughout the day. 

Tiesj Benoot agreed that the team's strategy was to have the Belgian in front and explained: "We knew there would be a fight for the start, but we didn't want to ride behind a group of 20 riders. So Wout was the best man to send along. Unfortunately, he was only out with 2 other riders. It looked just as good when only Alpecin seemed interested, but in the end 4-5 other teams joined."

After over 80 kilometers of attacking and counter-attacking, where van Aert often tried to spark a selection, he eventually went up the road with Quinn Simmons and Jakob Fugslang - the latter dropped back eventually to protect his GC aspirations. "At that moment I had already wasted so much energy that I felt there was no turning back. I had better continue. That way I can say goodbye to the yellow in a very beautiful way," van Aert explained. 

"We still got a nice margin. We had to wait and see which teams believed in victory. But when a few teams joined forces, you knew it would be difficult. In the end they had to do their best to come back, also because the wind blew in our favor. But it hurt me too. It was mission impossible," he added.

The rest was history. As soon as he got caught, van Aert dropped back in the group and lost the yellow jersey, which is now on the shoulders of Tadej Pogacar and UAE Team Emirates. He propelled his green jersey goals further by passing the intermediate sprint in first place, but Jumbo-Visma didn't benefit from the aggressive strategy.