Tour de France 2025: the blue of the Pyrenees and the yellow of “Pogi”

There are men of unparalleled affability. UAE Team Emirates' sporting director, Joxean Fernández Matxín, is one of those: he returns every smile, and with even greater intensity. Didn't he understand your question? He lets out a long laugh and slaps you on the shoulder. Thinks you're going to crash into the team bus? He quickly restrains you. The former sporting director of Saunier-Duval, a team kicked out of the 2008 Tour following climber Riccardo Riccò's positive test, after some spectacular performances, is the one who discovered gold in bars: Slovenian Tadej Pogacar .

Since July 5th and the big start of the Tour de France in Lille , it seems that no one can compete with the three-time winner of the event. What does he have left to beat, apart from his opponents? He is racing for the great history of his sport. There is, perhaps, only bad luck to get him. Matxín, at the start of the loop in Toulouse on Wednesday morning, July 16th, goes over "sacrifices", "training camps" and draws an arrow: "Per