{"id":821781,"date":"2026-07-24T22:47:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T22:47:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/821781\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T22:47:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T22:47:10","slug":"ayuso-and-pidcock-hit-a-wall-in-the-tour-de-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/821781\/","title":{"rendered":"Ayuso and Pidcock Hit a Wall in the Tour de France"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tom Pidcock<\/a> and Juan Ayuso<\/a> didn’t have a great day on Alpe d’Huez. The 5th and 8th placed riders in the general classification<\/a> struggled terribly on the final climb of Stage 19 of the Tour de France and dropped to 7th and 9th, respectively. Will they be able to hold onto their spots in the top ten in Saturday\u2019s grueling stage<\/a>?Ayuso made the biggest impression at the finish on Alpe d’Huez. The 23-year-old Spaniard had been Lidl-Trek<\/a>\u2019s lead-out man throughout this Tour de France, but after losing a significant amount of time in the time trial on Stage 16, things didn\u2019t go much better on Stage 19. Ayuso ultimately finished 6 minutes and 26 seconds behind stage winner Tadej Pogacar, with lead-out man Quinn Simmons by his side.The American champion immediately came to Ayuso\u2019s aid when he came to a sudden stop against an advertising board right after crossing the finish line. His coach, Aritz Arberas, told *Marca*<\/a>: \u201cJuan is showing character, even though he\u2019s not feeling his best. We didn\u2019t expect this, but that\u2019s just how the Tour de France is. It can crush you, and today it was Juan\u2019s turn.\u201d<\/p>\n

“He fought until the very last moment,” his coach observed. “He minimized his losses and is still seventh in the standings. We came here with higher ambitions, but we also have to look at the long term. This is an investment for next year. We\u2019ll let this sink in for now and assess what happened later. We\u2019re going to learn from this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the video<\/p>\n

Lidl-Trek sees Skjelmose as a better option than Ayuso<\/p>\n

At Lidl-Trek, it\u2019s even the case that Mattias Skjelmose, who was supposed to be a luxury domestique, is now suddenly the highest-ranked rider, in sixth place in the general classification. \u201cJuan\u2019s situation makes us angry, because we know how much work we\u2019ve put into this and what he\u2019s done for it. He hasn\u2019t been able to ride this Tour with the ease he\u2019s used to. He just doesn\u2019t feel quite fit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Team Manager Josu Larrazabal said they need to figure out exactly what\u2019s wrong with Ayuso. The fact is that he\u2019s no longer able to match the level he showed in the first two weeks during the third week. \u201cWe knew Juan wasn\u2019t in top form, but we didn\u2019t expect him to lose 6 minutes. Sometimes your body doesn\u2019t perform at 100 percent; we\u2019re swimming a bit against the current this season.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ayuso crashed in Paris-Nice this year, and just as he was regaining his top form in the Tour Auvergne-Rh\u00f4ne-Alpes, he fell ill. \u201cHe\u2019s missing that little extra something,\u201d said his team director. \u201cWe didn\u2019t get that final push that we had hoped for based on our preparation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo<\/p>\n

\"tom-pidcock\"\/<\/p>\n

Tom Pidcock<\/p>\n

Pidcock, too, hit his limit on Alpe d’Huez<\/p>\n

In addition to Ayuso, Pidcock also dropped in the standings. The British rider from Pinarello-Q36.5 finished another 2 minutes behind the Spaniard on the climb where he had won from the breakaway in 2023. \u201cOn the third-to-last climb, I pushed so hard that I paid for it on the final climb,\u201d Pidcock analyzed afterward. \u201cI was exhausted.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Of course, I’m still aiming for a top ten finish,” said the climber, who is currently in ninth place and, in theory, still has a 9-minute cushion over 11th place. “What a day\u2014I just didn\u2019t have anything left in my legs. It is what it is. It was great to see all those people who came here for the cycling, including my family. Thanks to everyone who made the atmosphere so great.”<\/p>\n

Pidcock, too, didn\u2019t have an ideal build-up to the 2026 Tour de France. He crashed into a ravine during the Tour of Catalonia and suffered a knee injury. He also made a comeback, but illness prevented him from racing the Tour of Switzerland. In that regard, Ayuso and Pidcock seem to be pushing their limits, with the Tour\u2019s toughest stage still ahead on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tom Pidcock and Juan Ayuso didn’t have a great day on Alpe d’Huez. The 5th and 8th placed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":821782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,171886,49602,85,63570,346968],"class_list":["post-821781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-juan-ayuso","tag-lidl-trek","tag-sports","tag-tom-pidcock","tag-tour-de-france-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=821781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/821782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=821781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=821781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=821781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}