Stage 6 is the longest one of the 109th Tour de France with 219.9km on the menu, starting from Binche, Belgium, with a Belgian Maillot Jaune, Wout van Aert, to reach Longwy, France, near the borders of Belgium and Luxemburg. The finish is the same as in 2017 when Peter Sagan imposed himself atop the côte des Religieuses (1.6km at 5.8%) despite unclipping his shoe up the hill. Is the Slovakian able to do it again? He finished quite far back in stage 5 to Arenberg. There’s a notable difference with five years ago: this time around, there’s the côte de Pulventeux with 5.3km to go. It’s 800 metres long with an average gradient of 12%. It’s probably too hard for the pure sprinters to target the victory in Longwy. It suits… van Aert! But what will the great Belgian have left in the tank after the troublesome and demanding day he had on the cobbles of northern France? The same question goes to Mathieu van der Poel who would normally be a hot favourite but he seems to have the Giro d’Italia – the first Grand Tour he completed – in his legs. It opens the way to punchy riders like David Gaudu, Benoît Cosnefroy, Dylan Teuns and more…
