Ennezat > Le Mont-Dore Puy de Sancy 166km

It’s going to go off! UAE and Visma seem to be locked in a battle just now, with plenty happening on and off the bike. This tension has been brewing for quite some time, there’s no love lost between the two camps. I think Visma will have carefully studied this stage and see it as an opportunity to test out UAE and Pogačar, especially now Almeida is out the race. This is a great chance to test the UAE domestiques and see how many of them survive deep into the finale. This isn’t a mountain stage, but it still has almost 4500m of climbing in just 166km, it’s probably the hardest non-mountain stage I’ve seen for a very long time. It’s also Bastille Day, so roadside will be jam packed, we could be in for an epic Tour de France stage.