Tadej Pogacar claimed victory on stage three of the Tour de France on Monday, outsprinting rival Jonas Vingegaard on the final climb to take the race's yellow leader's jersey. The Slovenian world champion, defending his Tour title, crossed the line two seconds ahead of the Danish rider at Les Angles, a ski station in the French Pyrenees, at the end of a 196-kilometre stage that had begun in Granollers, Spain.
Despite both riders being level on overall time, Pogacar assumed the lead by virtue of his superior finishing positions across the opening three stages. He also accumulated four additional bonus seconds on the day, enough to erase the six-second deficit he had carried into the stage. Ecuadorian Richard Carapaz, a former Giro d'Italia winner, finished third, edging out French teenage prodigy Paul Seixas in the same time as Vingegaard. Belgian Olympic champion Remco Evenepoel came home eighth, four seconds back, and sits third overall, now 23 seconds off the lead. Sunday's stage winner Isaac Del Toro — Pogacar's UAE Team Emirates team-mate — played a key role again, driving the pace on the approach to the final climb before Pogacar unleashed a decisive acceleration.
The stage unfolded with a breakaway group of 18 riders building an advantage of over three minutes before UAE Team Emirates steadily reeled them in. Spanish climber Raúl García Pierna attacked on the day's hardest ascent, the category-one Col de Toses, and briefly stayed clear, while Frenchman Alex Baudin claimed the polka-dot mountains jersey by topping several climbs. The last breakaway survivor was caught with 15 kilometres remaining, setting up a finale among the general classification contenders.
The finish area had been placed under a public exclusion order by French authorities due to raging wildfires burning some 70 kilometres away, with police clearing spectators from the final stretch of road. Despite calls from race organisers for fans to stay away, crowds remained present along the earlier parts of the route inside France.
The early duel between Pogacar and Vingegaard underscores why this contest is so closely watched — the two riders have dominated the Tour in recent years, and their dead-level standing after three stages sets up what promises to be a compelling battle through the mountains ahead. With Evenepoel also in contention and promising young riders such as Del Toro and Seixas already featuring prominently, the 2025 race has opened with striking intensity.