Paris-Nice 2025 Stage 6

March 14, 2025 There is no day off in Paris-Nice but on paper, the road between Saint-Julien-en-Saint-Alban and Berre l’Étang should produce a bunch sprint. There is only 1,500M of elevation across the 210KM. A tailwind would push them along the route South, following along the banks of the Rhône, before crossing to the Eastern shore of the river at Barbentane. The route continues South until they reach the finish in Berre l’Étang. This region is known to be quite windy and has seen echelon action in the Tour de la Provence in the past, around the Étang de Berre. The main news at the start was that second overall, Jonas Vingegaard of Visma-Lease a Bike, pulled out of the race. A crash in yesterday's stage caused pain in his hand and did not want to risk further injury. When TV coverage began with 58KM to go, the rain was coming down and the race was in pieces. Rémi Cavagna of Groupama FDJ was the last man left in the break as Jakub Otruba of Caja Rural-Seguros-RGA and Thomas Gachignard of TotalEnergies had been dropped. He had a gap of 2 minutes 25 seconds on a Visma-Lease a Bike led chase group which had six of their riders but only ten in total. Seven more, mostly Ineos riders, were about 10 seconds back with a group of 20, then another group totaling around 40 still further behind. The total gap between the splits was roughly 30 seconds. With 52KM to go, the Visma-Lease a Bike group and the Ineos group came together. At the same time, the groups of 20 and 40 joined forces and the gap between them was around 30 seconds. Cavagna was caught by the remnants of the favorites group with 42KM to go while the larger chase group was drifting to 1 minute 10 seconds. Through the Intermediate Sprint at 19.5KM to go, race leader Matteo Jorgenson of Visma-Lease a Bike took first for 6 bonus seconds, Mattias Skjelmose of Lidl-Trek took 4 seconds and Florian Lipowitz of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe got the remaining 2 seconds on offer. Tudor Pro Cycling led the chase behind but the gap was still going out. It was 1 minute 25 seconds by the time they hit the Intermediate Sprint point and they would not see the front of the race again. Visma-Lease a Bike took control of the front group and led through 2KM to go. Max Schachmann of Soudal Quickstep took the final few corners in the lead with Mads Pedersen of Lidl-Trek, Josh Tarling of Ineos, Axel Zingle of Visma-Lease a Bike, and Sam Watson of Ineos lined out behind him. Pedersen went long with 250M to go. Tarling almost got level with the Dane 100M from the line but Pedersen's sprint endurance out matched Tarling and Pedersen won the stage. Tarling finished next with his teammate Watson taking third. The GC was turned on its head today with groups all over the road. João Almeida and Brandon McNulty of UAE-XRG lost nearly 2 minutes and Lenny Martinez of Bahrain Victorious lost almost 9 minutes in the cross winds. Jorgenson still holds his GC lead with Lipowitz at 40 seconds and Skjelmose at nearly one minute. Ineos have stacked three riders in the top 10 with Thymen Arensman being the closed in fourth at 1 minute 20 seconds.