{"id":698824,"date":"2026-07-18T18:56:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T18:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/698824\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T18:56:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T18:56:12","slug":"probably-a-mistake-tom-pidcock-tumbles-back-down-the-tour-de-france-top-10-after-more-breakaway-antics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/698824\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Probably a mistake’ \u2013 Tom Pidcock tumbles back down the Tour de France top 10 after more breakaway antics"},"content":{"rendered":"

After soaring the standings with a seemingly race-flipping breakaway infiltration on Friday, Tom Pidcock<\/a> (Pinarello-Q36.5) crashed back down the Tour de France<\/a> general classification, and back down to earth, after another rollercoaster day in the mountains on stage 14.<\/p>\n

The British rider had gained more than seven minutes via the breakaway on stage 13<\/a>, lifting him to fourth overall and reigniting his GC hopes for the remainder of the race.<\/p>\n

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And the most remarkable thing was that he was at it again the very next day, somehow slipping into a secondary break that at one point gained more than two minutes and put him into virtual second place overall on the road.<\/p>\n

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And yet, that effort, and the lack of top-end climbing form that had left him off the pace on the Col du Tourmalet in the first week, caught up with him. Pidcock was dropped from the main GC group on the final climb of the Col du Haag went on to lose nearly three minutes to most of the contenders for the podium.<\/p>\n

\u201cI jumped across to the break \u2013 probably a mistake, with that last climb,\u201d Pidcock said. \u201cBut you know, whatever.\u201d<\/p>\n

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On a tough day through the Vosges mountains a strong breakaway went up the road but an interesting second escape group formed behind them, featuring Pidcock and also two of Jonas Vingegaard\u2019s Visma-Lease a Bike teammates who were acting as tactical pawns.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the end that made it more difficult, because it was not really smooth \u2013 no one wanted to do anything,\u201d Pidcock said of the effect his own presence had on the group.<\/p>\n

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\u201cBut in the end Visma rode, I guess to make it harder for UAE, but they were going to ride their pace no matter what so it didn\u2019t really change anything.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut at least it meant I got a little bit of a head start in the final, but on the last climb I didn\u2019t have much legs left.\u201d<\/p>\n

Having jumped from 10th to fourth 24 hours earlier, Pidcock is now back to ninth overall, still 26 seconds ahead of 10th-placed Lenny Martinez, but nearly three minutes off the podium.<\/p>\n

The world\u2019s biggest bike race deserves world-class coverage. Subscribe to Cyclingnews for unlimited access to our unrivalled reporting of the 2026 Tour de France. From Barcelona through to Paris, our experienced team will bring you breaking news, expert insight, and in-depth coverage from every stage as the battle for the yellow jersey plays out. Plus, access the Cyclingnews app to follow the action on the go! Find out more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After soaring the standings with a seemingly race-flipping breakaway infiltration on Friday, Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) crashed back down…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":698825,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-698824","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=698824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/698825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=698824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=698824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=698824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}