Tour de France 2023: Kasper Asgreen wins stage 18 as breakaway stays clear – live | Tour de France 2023

Soudal Quick Step celebrate:

Never write off a strong breakaway … much like Kwiatkowski’s win earlier in the race, while you are out there in front, you have a chance.

Top five on stage 18

A fascinating day in the end. Philipsen tried to stop Eenkhorn from bridging across to the breakaway … and ultimately, Eenkhorn’s presence was no doubt essential to the eventual success of what became a four-man escape group.

There is disbelief among the Eurosport pundits that the breakaway managed to hold off the chasing peloton. It certainly looked like Nils Politt, who put in a massive dig for Bora-Hansgrohe in the closing kilometres, was going to prove decisive in applying the catch.

They made it! The breakaway actually made it … an absolutely massive ride from Asgreen, who stood up and stamped on the pedals with about 250m to go on the final straight. The sprinters were bearing down on break, and were just a few metres away, but the Danish champion timed his final dig to perfection. Eenkhoorn was second.

That’s the first Tour de France stage win for the current Danish time trial champion, a previous winner of the Tour of Flanders.

A huge final effort from Campanaerts in the final kilometre also made a crucial difference.

Kasper Asgreen (Soudal Quick-Step) wins stage 18!

600m to go: Wow! I think they might make it!

1km to go: Just six seconds now! It’s a massive effort from the four men up front. Asgreen puts in another big turn in the break!

2.5km to go: Campanaerts wins the day’s combativity award for the “most aggressive rider”.

4km to go: The rest of the chasers are very, very happy that Politt is there and working. He’s single-handedly cut the gap to 9sec.

5km to go: Now Tim Declercq tries some blocking tactics for Soudal–Quick-Step… but Nils Politt (Bora-Hansgrohe) hits the front of the chasing bunch and suddenly the gap falls to 12sec.

7km to go: Lidl-Trek, Intermarché–Circus–Wanty and Alpecin-Deceuninck are the most prominent teams in the chase now. If the escape group didn’t have Asgreen, I don’t think I’d give them a hope here … but they definitely have a chance.

9km to go: The peloton has now rolled into the streets of Bourg-en-Bresse. They negotiate a sharp left-hander and then hit a long, straight, downhill stretch. The gap is 22sec.

11km to go: The co-ordination of the chase in the peloton appears to be faltering somewhat. However, as the road bends right and then left, the helicopter doesn’t have to zoom out too far from the four-man break to find the chasing peloton.

12km to go: The gap is 23sec. A reminder that the riders up front are Kasper Asgreen (Soudal–Quick-Step), Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X Pro Cycling Team) and Victor Campanaerts and Pascal Eenkhorn (Lotto Dstny).

14km to go: Now the gap falls to 23sec. The riders kick on desperately up at the front, trying to give themselves a chance of fighting for the stage win. But their days look numbered.

16km to go: The gap falls to 30sec. Bora-Hansgrohe lead the way on the front of the peloton, on the climb.

17km to go: Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-QuickStep) is visible at the front. Kelly, on Eurosport, thinks he is there to try and disrupt the chase, in aid of his teammate Asgreen up front.

Eenkhorn’s mouth hangs open as he puts in a big effort on the front of the break. He is really grinding it out on a long uncategorised climb. Asgreen takes a drink and bite to eat.

18km to go: According to this photo caption, it was Dad’s Gendarmerie, not Dad’s Army, at the roadside:

20km to go: The gap is 51sec. Big, big ride from Asgreen, who leads the way up front. What an absolute machine.

Over on the Soudal-Quickstep Twitter, here’s a delightful helicopter shot from off the telly:

23km to go: The gap rises to 48sec. The wind is gusty and strong, says Blythe on Eurosport. The sheer effort is visible on the faces of the two Lotto Dstny riders in the break, Campanaerts and Eenkhorn. On the other hand, Asgreen just looks comfortable and barely out of breath, despite the terrifyingly large amount of power he is applying to those pedals.

25km to go: The gap between break and peloton has fallen to 40sec.

With Jasper Philipsen going for his fifth stage win, here is some history on the most stage wins in a single Tour, shamelessly lifted from the official Tour de France site:

“The record of stage wins in a single Tour de France is eight, held by Charles Pélissier (1930), Eddy Merckx (1970 and 1974) and Freddy Maertens (1976). Gino Bartali and Bernard Hinault scored seven, in 1948 and 1979 respectively. The number six has been reached nine times, by François Faber (1909), Marcel Buysse (1913), André Leducq (1932), Jean Aerts (1933), René Le Grevès (1936), Merckx (1969 and 1972), Luis Ocaña (1973) and Mark Cavendish (2009). On 22 occasions, a rider has won five stages in a single Tour de France.”

30km to go: “These guys are not hanging about,” says Adam Blythe on the Eurosport motorbike, now at the front of the race. “It’s not a given that these guys are going to be caught. They are working hard.”

31km to go: The four up front are riding a team time trial to the finish now. (Or certainly trying to.) Eenkhorn looks to be tiring, and drops to the back.

“Mate, you’ve just got here,” says McEwen on commentary, in character as one of Eenkhorn’s fellow escapees. “Give me a break.”

34km to go: Great efforts from the four riders up front. The gap is still over a minute. Currently 1min 02sec. Now, Lidl-Trek and Bora-Hansgrohe have taken it up at the front of the peloton.

“They’re thinking this might be a difficult one to close down,” says Kelly on Eurosport.

The average speed for the day has just ticked up to 44km/h, which shows you how significantly the pace has increased.

36km to go: “I believe the correct pronunciation is “Dysentery”” emails Bob, on Lotto-Dstny.

I suppose you could say they have trouble with their vowels, much like Mark Cavendish’s brand, cvndsh.

“I had a bet with myself,” Campanaerts said of that time trial gearing. Thanks to Mark for emailing the link to this interview with ITV.

“Nowadays we all ride with digital groupsets, and that’s nice,” said the former Hour Record holder. “But it wasn’t working … so I thought, can I do it in this massive gear?”

41km to go: Alpecin-Deceuninck, Jayco-AlUla and Team DSM are massed at the front of the bunch, although the bunch is noticeably strung out now. The pace is hotter than it was, and this is a real race now, as opposed to the slightly strange game of cat-and-mouse we had earlier. The enlarged break of four riders now has 1min 09sec and the sprinters’ teams don’t want to give them too much rope …

42km to go: How does one pronounce the Dstny in Lotto-Dstny? I’d go “Destiny”, but it seems that the excellent Sean Kelly is going for “Dynasty”.

43km to go: On commentary, Robbie McEwen thinks the wind will be a factor in the final. He says it’s a crosswind blowing between 20 and 25km/h.

45km to go: “I am starting to warm to the eccentricity of Campenaerts.” emails Claus. “I was watching him during Tuesday’s time trial, labouring uphill in an insanely high gear and spinning like a hamster on the flat. The commentators were wondering if he had made a bet to complete the whole time trial just in one gear. Is there anything to confirm that?”

I saw that, and heard the commentators wondering why, but didn’t hear any confirmation of the reason. Did anyone see Campenaerts asked about this? Email me!

47km to go: The script is obviously written for a bunch sprint … the leading four riders have just over a minute on the chasing pack at the moment.

They look to have no hope, but then again, no one gave Michal Kwiatkowski, or anyone else in that breakaway, a chance of staying away on Grand Colombier:

Abrahamson wins the intermediate sprint at Saint-Rambert-en-Bugey

52km to go: That said, will an uphill kick to the finish line suit a bigger rider such as Pedersen?

53km to go: Philipsen has five top 10s (and of course four wins) at the Tour. Pedersen has four top 10s and one win.

All things being equal, those two will be duking it out for the win today.

55km to go: The average speed for the day is 42.9km/h, which is fairly slow for a flattish day.

57km to go: Campanaerts, of course, is the guy who once asked someone out via a message written on his chest. It probably wasn’t the most alluring offer.

58km to go: The pace has noticeably picked up. Having gone back to pick up his teammate, Campanaerts then comes charging past the two up front, and they can’t keep pace with him.

59km to go: Campanaerts has now sat up to wait for Eenkhorn. So Abrahamsen and Asgreen are up front on their own.

The gap between the front of the race and the peloton is 48sec. The gap between break and the two Lotto-Dstny chasers is just 6sec.

60km to go: Matt Winston, who is on the staff at Team DSM, with a funny Ashes-related quote from John Degenkolb (a German):

63km to go: Pascal Eenkhorn (Lotto-Dstny) has now been released to make it across to the three-man breakaway. He is 11sec behind the group up front.

A reminder that the three riders up front are: Kasper Asgreen (Soudal–Quick-Step), Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X Pro Team) and Victor Campanaerts (Lotto–Dstny).

67km to go: Mindless Ciccone “humour” from back in 2019.

Just the 25sec for the break now … this is coming back together soon, isn’t it?

68km to go: The gap is now hovering at around 32sec. We just had a shot of Giulo Ciccone in his all polka-dot outfit. Daring.

70km to go: We may still have a box-office finale to the stage after a slow start. And the gap is falling even more, now down to 36sec. And now 32sec.

“I didn’t like it one little bit,” says Kirby on Eurosport of Philipsen’s behaviour in shutting down Eenkhorn. “The more I think about it, the more upset I’m getting.”

71km to go: Here’s a screenshot of Philipsen shutting the door on Eenkhorn.

The gap is 42sec. Surely we are going to get more attempts to bridge?

73km to go: It seems that discussions are ongoing between Philipsen, Lotto-Dstny and others. Over on Elon Musk’s Twitter, Philipsen is taking some flak for what did look like straightforward bullying (and potentially dangerous riding too if he physically tried to block Eenkhorn).

75km to go: Victor Lafay, also of Cofidis, is off the back.

76km to go: Simon Geschke, of Cofidis, has been dropped. He said yesterday was his hardest ever day on a bike … and today is looking miserable, too.

79km to go: The gloves are coming off. Not literally. But riders are trying to get across to the three-man break. It appeared that Jasper Philipsen just went and tried to stop someone from trying to bridge, because he (Philipsen) wants a sprint. It was Pascal Eenkhoorn who burst out of the bunch, apparently trying to bridge.

“It’s a bullying tactic there, it doesn’t sit well,” says Daryl Impey on commentary for Eurosport. “This is the new mentality of the peloton that is coming through.”

I’m not sure it’s new for the more senior riders to try and control things? Surely that’s a relic of cycling’s past, more than anything.

79km to go: “I agree with you that stages like the one today have their place in the tour,” emails Michael from Calgary, Alberta, Canada. “As Sir Paul once sang about Silly Love Songs, what’s wrong with that, I’d like to know.

“One thing I wish was an annual requirement is the team time trial in addition to the individual … and preferably including at least one significant climb and descent.”

80km to go: Lotto-Density suddenly take it up at the front, on the climb. They are trying to bring this back, and spice up the second half of the stage. The gap falls to 37sec.

(I know, it’s Lotto-Dstny, not Lotto-Density.)

82km to go: The gap is falling! The break is on the second climb of the route, a cat-four at Côte de Boissieu. The gap is down to 43sec. Maybe it will go out again after the climb? We shall see.

A road sign pointing to Turin! I was there in March. Underrated city. Try the farinata.

The Lac du Bourget.

86km to go: Steve Cummings, in the Ineos Grenadiers car, has just given Adam Blythe, on the Eurosport motorbike, an ice cream. The gap 54sec.

Here’s a Cummings Tour de France win from the archive:

87km to go: Impey has some interesting thoughts on Thomas de Gendt, the Belgian breakaway specialist. He says riders in the peloton wondered how he always managed to stay away in breakaways, but that things changed when he revealed his secrets. He doesn’t actually explain what those secrets were …

The gap continues to hover at around 1min.

88km to go: These stages are all part of the Tour de France’s rich tapestry, if you ask me. They simply can’t be flat-out all day, every day. From a British perspective, there would be a lot more intrigue if Mark Cavendish was still in the game, and he was still aiming for the record.

89km to go: The gap between today’s three-man break and peloton is 58sec.

91km to go: Carlton Kirby has had his lunch, and is back on the Eurosport microphone. Daryl Impey reminisces on his two days in the yellow jersey, 10 years ago: “To be able to have done that in my career, it’s amazing,” he says. “Every time I’ve gone back to the Tour, I thought, how was I able to do that? I didn’t sleep in the jersey, but I definitely had it close to my bed.”