Pogacar's Paris stats show just how fast he and Van der Poel were in the final stage of the Tour de France

We rarely see a spectacle like the one we witnessed on Sunday during the final stage of the Tour de France. Mathieu van der Poel and Tadej Pogačar put on an unprecedented show on the Butte Montmartre, with the Dutchman ultimately emerging as the heroic winner. Pogi ’s stats show just how extraordinary their performance was.

For a brief moment on Sunday, after Stage 21 of the Tour, it looked like Jonas Abrahamsen had claimed the KOM on Butte Montmartre. That was with the very important caveat that Pogacar hadn’t yet posted his Strava data online. After all, there were more important things to focus on after a fifth Tour victory.

That Strava file is now up and running online, so we can pull up the stats for a bit of analysis. To start at the beginning, we’ll first look at the first (of the three) sections of the climb to Montmartre. The pace shot up right away there (thanks to Mads Pedersen), and Pogacar clocked a time of 1.26 minutes.

That immediately set a new record for a rider in a race. The previous record was held by Wout van Aert, who clocked a time of 1 minute and 31 seconds during the 2024 Olympic road race. Note: that was after a race covering no less than 250 kilometers. With Sunday’s course totaling less than 90 kilometers, it was a completely different story.

However, that record was broken again, as Pogacar accelerated once more on the second climb up the Butte Montmartre. UAE provided the lead-out, and eventually the yellow jersey himself put in a powerful sprint. Only Van der Poel was able to keep up, resulting in a time of no less than 1 minute and 24 seconds—an average speed of 35.3 kilometers per hour. Phew.

The record would ultimately remain at 1 minute and 24 seconds, even though Van der Poel was in the lead on the third and final climb up Butte Montmartre. Pogacar fell a few meters behind, but his time was clocked at 1 minute and 24 seconds once again. As many people know, MVDP rarely uses Strava, so we won’t know his official time.

At the top of the climb, the pair were, of course, still (far) from the finish. First, they hit the descent at full speed, with Pogacar reaching speeds of just over 70 kilometers per hour. When Pogi gave it his all one last time just before the final kilometer, he reached a top speed of 56.9 kilometers per hour. Eventually, he ran out of steam, and the rest is history.