Yellow and black jerseys swarmed the front of the peloton throughout the day. Jumbo Visma ended hopes of an early breakaway on stage 14 of the Tour de France, foreshadowing a big attack by Jonas Vingegaard of the Maillot Jaune. It also foreshadowed a big attack by Jonas Vingegaard in the maillot jaune.

Vingegaard held off the Slovenian for a bonus sprint at the summit on the Col de Joux Plane, where two bikes were blocking the acceleration of Tadej Pogachar (UAE Team Emirates). Pogachar, however, returned the favor by sprinting to second place behind Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos) in Morzine.

In the end, after all the hard work Jumbo-Visma had put in during the stage, Vingegaard added just one second to his advantage, extending his slight lead over Pogachar to 10 seconds. But as Vingegaard's teammates arrived at the Jumbo-Visma bus one after the other, they declared themselves satisfied with the day's work.

Sepp Kuss was still Vingegaard's last man, leading Vingegaard for most of the Juu Pass until Pogachar's second-in-command, Adam Yates, attacked and split the lead group. Behind Jumbo Visma's relentless pacemaking, it seems that his goal was to suppress Pogachar's acceleration and draw out Vingegaard's endurance.

"We had the kind of race we wanted," Kuss said as he warmed down outside the bus. We had a lot of teams asking us what we were doing riding 20 seconds behind the breakaway, but we wanted to ride our own rhythm and have a tough day. I have no regrets, I gave it everything I had. Jonas is really strong, but Pogachar is right there too. It's still a big battle." [When Pogachar accelerated furiously 3.7km from the summit, it looked at one point as if the Slovenian would take the yellow for Vingegaard, but the Dane never lost sight of Vingegaard and caught him in the last 2km of the climb. In the upper reaches of the climb, Contador and Schleck were slowing down, looking at each other before the bonus sprint by bike. But again, there was little to separate the two.

"Ideally, I would have liked a beautiful solo win, but it was nice to see him make it to Pogachar and get the bonus seconds at the top," Kuss said.

"At the finish, you never know who's going to come out in front and take the stage win.

When Wout Van Aert buckled down early in Friday's Grand Colombier, it seemed clear that the Belgian would play an important role in Jumbo Visma's plans for stage 14, and it proved to be the case. After taking the lead on the final climb of the Col de la Llamas, Van Aert's day seemed to end at the foot of the Jouplain, but he was replaced by Vingegaard, who returned to the front in yet another defiant stint.

"I knew Rafal Mayka was trying to drop me and Wilco [Kelderman], but I was able to slow down a bit and fight back.

"It's been a really tough day for us, but I hope it's the same for the rest of the field. I was hoping to get a better gap on Jonas, but it looks like Jonas and Taddei are evenly matched at the moment.

A group crash in the early stages of the race halted the race for nearly half an hour, but Jumbo Visma quickly took the lead of the pack after the restart, chipping away at the pack on the Col de Cou and Col de Fou, and maintaining a good pace in Lamaze.

"The idea was to make the stage as hard as possible, so we did all the climbs at a pretty high pace to make the race suitable for Jonas and not explode," explained Taige Benoot. 'This plan worked perfectly. Jonas did not take a big gap, but he did take a bonus at the top of the Jouplain.

In a video interview on the first rest day, Vingegaard suggested that Jumbo-Visma had a concrete plan to break Pogacar's resolve in this Tour, along the same lines as his remarkable simultaneous attack over the Galibier a year ago. The Slovenian and his team coped well with a sustained push here, but Sunday's run to Saint-Gervais-Mont-Blanc and Wednesday's crossing of the Col de la Rose will raise further questions.

"I'm not overjoyed by a one-second gap," Van Aert admitted, but grinned when asked how Jumbo Visma will approach stage 15. 'What are they planning for tomorrow?'

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