Chapter 379 190: The Great Baiye Plateau Showdown Between the Three Honor Jerseys

A total length of 10.1 km, an average gradient of 8.1%, and a maximum gradient of 10.3%.

As for the Baiye Plateau climb at the finish, it was 15.7 km long, with an average gradient of 7.8% and a maximum gradient of 11.3%.

This made it clear that even though today's first First Category Climb, the Col de Peyresourde, was brutally difficult from the get-go, it was actually the easiest one compared to the climbs that would follow—

After Huang Chong followed the peloton over the first climb and through the intermediate sprint point at the 37-kilometer mark, the host of sprinters who had attacked from the start all dropped back into the main group.

After all, sprinters only had two goals on a stage like this:

First, to grab the intermediate sprint points.

Second, to avoid being eliminated by the time cut so they could continue in the race. As long as they did that, everything was fine.

They couldn't care less about their final finishing time.

To them, there was no real difference between finishing three minutes behind the winner or thirty.

However, the moment the sprinters dropped back to the peloton, a new breakaway began to form as the race hit the second First Category Climb: the Mente Pass Climb.

This new breakaway was a strong one, with twelve riders in total: Carapaz and Ben Healy from the EF Education Team;

Jorgensen from the Uno-X Team;

De Plus from the Ineos Grenadiers Team;

Mas and Aranburu from the Movistar Team;

Jungels and Sobrero from the Red Bull Bora Team;

Simon Yates from the Jieke Team;

Martin from the Cofidis Team;

Jakob Fuglsang from the Israel-Premier Tech Team;

and Martínez from the FDJ Team.

Clearly, today's breakaway was much stronger than yesterday's.

The Movistar Team's objective was the most transparent. Not only had they sent their GC contender, Mas, but they'd also included a domestique to act as a water carrier. They were clearly aiming for the stage win.

But the riders attracting the most attention in the breakaway weren't well-established stars like Simon Yates. Instead, all eyes were on Martin from the Cofidis Team and Martínez from the FDJ Team.

The reason was simple: they were both local French riders.

As this was the Tour de France, the crowd was naturally dominated by French fans, so it was only logical they would cheer for their local riders.

Of course, the peloton with Huang Chong also received thunderous cheers, applause, and shouts every time they went over a climb.

Some of the more fanatical fans even stripped naked, covered themselves in body paint, and ran alongside the peloton on the climbs as the riders passed.

This was because his group contained not only the riders in the classification jerseys, but also every team's Core Commander, top domestiques, and all the world's greatest road cycling superstars.

Star power truly is influential everywhere.

But of course, there were also incidents that left you not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

For instance, in the past couple of days of racing, both Pogačar and Vingegaard had been pelted with potato chips by local French fans on the roadside.

And the TotalEnergies Team had more than a dozen of their top-tier race bikes stolen overnight.

Calculated in RMB, the loss could be as high as one to two million.

You had to admit, events held in Europe were always full of incidents that were both exciting and utterly bizarre, creating a distinct sense of magical realism and absurdity.

Soon, with the breakaway successfully established on the second First Category Climb, their time gap to the peloton began to grow steadily.

But in the peloton, just as the Visma Team themselves had announced at yesterday's press conference, the plan was to help Vingegaard win the stage.

Therefore, the task of controlling the pace fell entirely to Visma's team of domestiques.

Huang Chong, along with the riders from UAE, Quick Step, and the Ineos Grenadiers Team, saw that someone else was setting the pace and were happy to sit in their draft to conserve energy.

But Huang Chong soon noticed that Jorgenson, the best-performing domestique of this year's Tour de France, hadn't taken an early turn at the front.

In fact, even after 150 kilometers of grueling climbs, when the peloton had successfully cleared all the First Category Climbs and was preparing to descend, the guy still hadn't taken a single turn at the front.

However, as they began the final HC Level climb, the Baiye Plateau, Jorgenson had moved up right behind his teammates.

Seeing this, everyone knew he was ready to take over from his teammates at a moment's notice to lead his captain up the final, long and steep HC Level climb.

Without a moment's hesitation before starting the climb, Huang Chong pulled out a prepared Energy Gel and squeezed it into his mouth.

The wrapper on this Energy Gel had no flashy fonts, designs, or marketing slogans. It clearly wasn't one provided by the Red Bull Bora Team.

But the energy boost it provided, including its ability to eliminate fatigue, far surpassed that of any commercially available Energy Gel in the world.

Forget other energy gels—even the world's most potent performance-enhancing drugs couldn't hope to match its effects.

After Huang Chong finished one of the only two special recovery Energy Gels awarded by the system, Aldag's voice crackled in his earpiece.

"Huang, you're about to hit the Baiye Plateau climb. Fuel up now while you still have time. Once you're on the ascent, there won't be any time to eat or drink!"