"I was sure today that the break had a really big chance to make it."
You'd be forgiven if you thought the Uno-X Mobility sports director, Gabriel Rasch, was talking after stage two or three of this year's Tour de France. The two lumpy road stages in Catalonia looked tailor-made for break glory: too hard for the sprinters and no obvious reason for the general classification teams to control. But no, a general lack of desire to venture ahead of the peloton on stage two and the insatiable appetite of Tadej Pogačar on stage three put paid to any hopes of a breakaway succeeding.
Stage four was the antidote to general classification dominance. Finishing in Foix, a town which has always been friendly to the breakaway, the road from Carcassonne was hot, heavy and hilly – a day where only the strongest could survive at the pointy end of proceedings. One such rider was Torstein Træen, who we can now call a seasoned breakaway merchant. Less than a year on from his exploits on stage six of the 2025 Vuelta a España, the Norwegian has done it again — he's in the leader's jersey of a Grand Tour.
As an individual, Træen's four-day stint in the red jersey in September was the highlight of his career – he has now surpassed that by moving into yellow.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
"We wanted to have somebody in the break," explained Rasch. "It was a very big group, and we ended up with Torstein in the group. We weren't sure if UAE wanted to let them have a big gap and it didn't look like it at the start, but then eventually they backed off, and then we started thinking about the yellow jersey. It's special."
It's a highlight in Uno-X's history, a squad who have a habit of punching above their weight seeking out breakaway success. Fredrik Dversnes denied the sprinters in Milan on stage 15 of this year's Giro d'Italia.
These examples demonstrate the need to get into the break if you want to get anything at all out of the biggest races. As the first three stages of this Tour – and the last five or six years of Grand Tour racing – have shown, if you wait in the bunch you will be beaten by Tadej Pogačar; if not by the Slovenian, then Isaac del Toro. If not the Mexican, then Jonas Vingegaard. The best riders in the punchy finales are the general classification riders.
Additionally, if you wait for the nailed-on sprint stages, you will have to compete with the very best in the business. The 30-odd other riders in the breakaway on stage four were up against it when Lidl-Trek got their three punchy powerhouses in amongst it.
It was a tactical masterclass from Mads Pedersen, Quinn Simmons and Mathias Vacek, who looked the strongest of the lot on the rolling parcours from Carcassonne to Foix. There was very little any other team could do, even the impressive Movistar duo of Pablo Castrillo and Raúl García Pierna.
"It was a perfect day," acknowledged the Lidl-Trek sports director and former Tour winner, Andy Schleck. "We had three guys in front, and frankly, I think they were the three strongest in the breakaway. In the last 20km, they knew what to do, and they finished it up perfectly.
"It was perfect that we had all three of them there – with their big engines, they can make it work, and we could see that Mads was feeling really well. It was just about managing the others, I think they tried their chances, but with Vacek and Quinn there, it's quite hard to get away in a final like this."
The stage win for Lidl-Trek, yellow for Uno-X. Tomorrow should be on for the sprinters. But after that, any team without a fast-finisher or general classification rider should try their luck in the break. The Tour may only be four days in, but stages disappear quickly, and as UAE and Visma have shown in recent years, they won't turn down a sniff at another win.
