{"id":538619,"date":"2026-07-13T03:42:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T03:42:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/538619\/"},"modified":"2026-07-13T03:42:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T03:42:15","slug":"tadej-pogacar-urges-radical-overhaul-of-tour-de-france-amid-stifling-heatwave-tour-de-france-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/538619\/","title":{"rendered":"Tadej Pogacar urges radical overhaul of Tour de France amid stifling heatwave | Tour de France 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tadej Pogacar called for radical change to the professional racing calendar after another day of stifling temperatures, as Mathieu van der Poel won the shortened ninth stage of the Tour de France<\/a> from Malemort to Ussel, with Tom Pidcock finishing third.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had the power I would change all the calendar and not race in July and August in hot places,\u201d Pogacar said. \u201cI\u2019d do a completely different calendar, but it\u2019s not something I can do.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Slovenian rider, a four\u2011time Tour de France winner, said: \u201cMaybe the next step is to start the stages earlier. Yesterday there was a proposal to start at 10, but it doesn\u2019t change anything because then you finish in the heat.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to start at eight or nine, or even before. It\u2019s a little bit shit, but I think the body can adapt to waking up at five o\u2019clock in the morning and doing a stage at eight. But I think I\u2019ve said enough.\u201d<\/p>\n

The undulating stage to Ussel, with three steep climbs in the final 80 kilometres and including almost 2,700 metres of altitude gain, may have been shortened because of the heatwave<\/a> but the ferocious pace and unrelenting contours had dramatic repercussions for some in the peloton.<\/p>\n

Despite having what he described as a \u201cmanageable\u201d saddle sore, Pidcock had his best day in the Tour to date, as one of the key animators of a 15-rider breakaway that also included the former world road race champion Van der Poel, of Alpecin\u2011Premier Tech.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was going super-well today,\u201d Pidcock, racing for Pinarello-Q36.5, said. \u201cI had really good legs and was feeling really strong. If I compare it to the last time I was in a breakaway at the Tour de France, on the gravel stage to Troyes two years ago, today I was really in the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just shows that my level is higher, but my gears stopped working, and I was out the back of the group on the last climb. But when I got to the sprint I was hopeless.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it\u2019s a shame, but I don\u2019t think I would have come around Mathieu anyway. He\u2019s very hard to beat in those situations, but at least I was there, sprinting for the win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mathieu van der Poel won the shortened ninth stage of the Tour de France. Photograph: kei Tsuji\/GodingImages\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

The Tour always has hot days, but in sustained heatwaves as draining as this there is only so much an ice vest, ice socks and cold drinks can do. Beyond the broiling finish line in Ussel, many riders, still in full kit and racing shoes, dropped their bikes to the road and plunged into ice baths in waiting team vans.<\/p>\n

Paddling pools and tin baths are even being used by some teams, in a desperate effort to reduce riders\u2019 core temperatures as soon as possible after racing.<\/p>\n

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At Paul Seixas\u2019s Decathlon CMA CGM team, a portable cryotherapy unit to cool the riders after each stage is travelling with the team, speeding recovery by lowering body temperature and promoting sleep. \u201cI\u2019ve only done it once,\u201d Tiesj Benoot, teammate to Seixas, said. \u201cYou sit in a capsule at minus 120 degrees for about three minutes. It\u2019s even more intense than an ice bath.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the Professional Cyclists Association was among those to argue that more still needed to be done to protect rider wellbeing. \u201cThis once again highlights the need to fully implement the extreme weather conditions protocol,\u201d the CPA said of yet another searingly hot afternoon.<\/p>\n

Echoing the comments of Pogacar, the CPA added that \u201csummer race start times must evolve in order to protect athlete health\u201d and called for \u201ddiscussions to be held with all stakeholders\u201d during the winter to find a solution before the summer of 2027.<\/p>\n

Benoot was among those who felt that shortening the stage to Ussel did not make much difference to the peloton. \u201cIt\u2019s 40 minutes\u2019 less racing, but we\u2019ve already been riding in this same heat for eight days,\u201d Benoot said. \u201cI get the feeling ASO wants to make a statement, but other measures would benefit us more.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Tour director, Christian Prudhomme, said that an earlier start to the stage to Ussel would not have been possible, for logistical reasons. \u201cWaking the riders up at 5am is pretty difficult, even if that\u2019s already happening, for anti-doping controls,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The rest day on Monday will offer some respite from racing in the heat but with temperatures predicted to stay in the high 30s into the middle of next week, it will be of little comfort to those who are already suffering.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tadej Pogacar called for radical change to the professional racing calendar after another day of stifling temperatures, as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":538620,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":["post-538619","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538619","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538619"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538619\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/538620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}