Stage 16 was kind of meh until the last few km when Wout van Aert attacked. Some broadcasters/bloggers/journos didn't understand it and thought he might get some grief but he'd been radioed that Carapaz was at the back of the group and he thought an attack with Vingegaard might create a gap. Didn't work, so a little late excitement that amounted to nothing.

Today, on the other hand... wow. UAE just hammered the bunch and shedded riders up the last climb. Pogacar attacked the remains with 7 or 8 km to go on a climb that over that stretch averaged about 10% and then it was just the three guys who are 1-2-3 in the GC. Carapaz was bluffing/sandbagging but neither Pogacar nor Vingegaard believed he was gassed. So they weren't surprised when he attacked but Vingegaard still got gapped. In retrospect, Carapaz probably wasn't bluffing that much - Vingegaard managed his way back and ended up outsprinting Carapaz to the finish! That was an incredibly impressive effort.

But there's just no getting around the fact that Pogacar is easily the class of this Tour. He was never threatened on a very difficult day. The yellow jersey doesn't usually need to go for wins. He had a 5+ minute lead today but he still wanted the win.