La Planche des Belles Filles stands just 1,140 metres above sea level, but the mountaintop has dominated the horizon through the opening week of the Tour de France. Reading the runes of the seconds won and lost in the team time trial or the split in the finale at Épernay felt like a fool’s errand; every supposed truth revealed was in the eye of the beholder. The trek through the Vosges on stage 6, on the other hand, should provide a rather more impartial view of the lie of the land on this Tour.
With so much distance still to run between here and Paris, stage 6 will not be decisive but there is every chance that it will be indicative of what is to follow. La Planche des Belles Filles has certainly proved a reliable oracle in the past. On each occasion that the Tour has visited, the maillot jaune at the summit has gone on to win the race overall: Bradley Wiggins in 2012, Vincenzo Nibali in 2014 and Chris Froome in 2017.
Thursday’s trek through the Vosges features almost 4,000 metres of total climbing, and the final haul to the finish – extended by a viciously steep kilometre this time out – is certainly hard enough to provoke gaps among the favourites. The Tour will neither be won nor lost at La Planche des Belles Filles, but the fissures opened on its slopes will set the tenor for the days ahead and could well suffice to tip the balance of power at Team Ineos and Movistar.
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Defending champion Geraint Thomas and Tour de Suisse winner Egan Bernal began this Tour as co-leaders of Ineos. So far, the road has provided no separation beyond the five seconds Bernal gained at Épernay, but Thursday offers a chance for more than marginal gains to be made à la pédale. Whatever the outcome at La Planche, however, Ineos directeur sportif Nicolas Portal insisted that it would still be premature to assign the role of outright leader to either rider on the basis of the stage result.
"No, it would be much too early because the Tour is very hard in the second and third weeks," Portal said. "In the past, we’ve often seen that contenders have lost ground at La Planche or the first mountain stage, and then they’ve taken flight after that and been very strong in the second and third week. Tomorrow the idea is not to lose time. If we take time tomorrow, that’s a big bonus but it’s not the objective."
At Movistar, Nairo Quintana and Mikel Landa both harbour public ambitions of winning the Tour, while Alejandro Valverde’s reported weight loss has raised the prospect that the world champion, too, is in France with an eye to the final podium. The stage should provide a clearer overview of their respective challenges, not least because the trio need to start clawing back the ground Movistar conceded in Sunday’s team time trial. "It will be a day to measure our own strength and see where we are," Quintana said in Colmar on Wednesday.
The route
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