Tour de France 2025 Stage 12

July 17, 2025 The Tour has been brilliant so far with hard racing day after day as if it was a series of one day classics. With every Grand Tour however comes the high mountains and that time has arrived. Stage 12 is 180KM from Auch in the Gers department to Hautacam in the Hautes-Pyrénées totaling 3,800M of climbing. The first 122KM is a gradually rolling profile with nothing serious of note. The intermediate sprint comes with 85KM to go in the town of Bénéjacq just after a fourth category climb of the Côte de Labatmale. From there, the road slowly rises to Ferrières at 59KM to go to start the 12KM, 7.6% Col du Soulor. The Col des Bordères is next at 3.3KM at 8.1%. At the top, the riders have over 20KM of descending to Ayros-Arbouix before the start of climb to the finish atop Hautacam, a grueling 13.5KM climb at nearly 8%. The long stretch of flat at the beginning will suit larger riders to get in the break but with such difficult climbs back-ended on the stage, it will be hard for a break to make it to the finish. Historically, the GC men want to battle for the stage win on the first mountains stage so it is likely that that is what we will see today. The temperatures were up in the mid 30'sC (~90F) for the rollout through Auch, home of former sports director at Team Sky Nicolas Portal, where a tribute was paid following his death in 2020. A huge group of nearly 50 riders split off the front after about 15KM of racing. The best placed rider in the group was Carlos Rodríguez of Ineos at 5 minutes 44 seconds. He had four teammates who were pushing but there were plenty of others interested in creating a gap back to the peloton. The gap slowly crept out and with 135KM to go, the break was out to 2 minutes with UAE-XRG, Uno X Mobility, and EF-Education EasyPost controlling. Only about ten riders were actually taking pulls in the front group and as a result, their lead was just 1 minute 40 seconds at the start of the Côte de Labatmale with 90.5KM to go. A few kilometers later, Mathieu van der Poel of Alpecin-Deceuninck went for the intermediate sprint but he was challenged and beaten by Laurenz Rex of Intermarché-Wanty who was protecting the Green Jersey spot of his teammate, Biniam Girmay. When the break hit the base of the Col du Soulor, the average speed of the race was a blistering 49.5KM/HR. Riders who had been pulling, started to drop away but the peloton were doing a strong pace themselves and were just 2 minutes 10 seconds behind. Axel Laurance of Ineos continued to drive the pace on the climb and cut the group to less than 20 riders with over 7KM to the top. In the peloton, Visma-Lease a Bike took control at the bottom of the Soulor. White Jersey holder, Remco Evenepoel of Soudal Quickstep, was the first top GC rider to lose contact, dropping away with 8KM to climb. With 5.5KM to go, race leader Ben Healy of EF-Education EasyPost was dropped but so was Matteo Jorgenson so Visma-Lease a Bike decided to back off. Healy hung around 15 seconds back but looked cooked from the heat and the effort and eventually started to slide. Kévin Vauquelin of Arkéa-B&B Hotels was dropped next and the group was down to around 15 riders. In the break, Michael Woods of Israel-Premier Tech emerged as the best atop the Col du Soulor with Mattias Skjelmose of Lidl-Trek chasing at 10 seconds and Bruno Armirail of Decathlon AG2R, Michael Storer of Tudor Pro Cycling, and Einer Rubio of Movistar another 10 seconds back. Even with all of the work from Ineos, there was no sight of Carlos Rodríguez who could not follow the best riders in the break. At the bottom, Armirail caught and went passed Woods and Skjelmose to start the 3KM Col des Bordères with 38KM to go and a 10 second head start. Rubio and Storer started climbing 36 seconds after Armirail and the favorites group was at 2 minutes 20 seconds. Armirail extended his lead to 1 minute by the top on Skjelmose, Woods, as well as Storer and Rubio who regained contact. UAE-XRG and Visma-Lease a Bike rode steady on the Col des Bordères. Amazingly, Evenepoel found his rhythm on the climb and made it up to the favorites group on the downhill run towards Ayros-Arbouix with 26KM to go along with Vauquelin and a few others. A few kilometers later, the chase group of Skjelmose, Woods, Storer, and Rubio were caught by the favorites group leaving just Armirail out front with a 1 minute 50 second lead. Armirail fully committed to the bottom and started Hautacam with 1 minute 45 seconds. Tim Wellens rode the first 800M of the climb at the front of the peloton for UAE-XRG and did a lot of damage. Evenepoel and a number of Visma-Lease a Bike domestiques went backwards as did Felix Gall of Decathlon AG2R. A few hundred meters later, Jhonatan Narváez of UAE-XRG ramped up the pace like a sprint lead out with only his teammate, Tadej Pogačar, and Jonas Vingegaard of Visma-Lease a Bike able to hold the wheel. When Narváez pulled off, Pogačar attacked and got a gap on Vingegaard. The Dane settled into his rhythm and tried to haul himself back. Pogačar caught and passed Armirail with 11KM to go as Vingegaard was chasing at 10 seconds. A group behind Vingegaard formed with Primož Roglič and Florian Lipowitz of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe, Oscar Onley of Picnic-PostNL, Tobias Johannessen of Uno-X Mobility, and Vauquelin at 1 minute 25 seconds from Pogačar with 8.5KM to go. Pogačar entered the steepest section at 6KM to go as the gradient lifted consistently over 10%. He had 1 minute on Vingegaard, 2 minutes on the Roglič group and another 20 seconds back to Evenepoel who was pacing very well. Third place on the road was coming down to a battle between Onley and Lipowitz. Lipowitz pulled clear with 3.5KM to go and was in pursuit of Vingegaard another 45 seconds further up the mountain. Pogačar got into the barriers at 2KM to go and stormed his way up to the finish line to take the victory. Vingegaard came in 2 minutes 11 seconds later with Lipowitz just 12 seconds back. Johannessen and Onley came in together for fourth and fifth on the stage. The GC has been split wide open at the top. Pogačar took Yellow back and now has a 3 minute 31 second lead over Vingegaard and 4 minutes 45 seconds on Evenepoel. Lipowitz jumped from eighth to fourth, now at 5 minutes 34 seconds.