Pogacar crushes rivals on opening Tour of Switzerland stage

World champion Tadej Pogacar sent out an ominous warning to his Tour de France rivals with a jaw-dropping dominant victory on the opening stage of the Tour of Switzerland on Wednesday.

Despite there being four more days of mostly mountainous racing to come this week, Pogacar effectively ended all suspense halfway through the opening 144km stage, which started and finished in Sondrio in northern Italy.

After his UAE Team Emirates squad had pushed the pace over the first climb of the day, Pogacar simply rode off the front of the peloton at the foot of the second with 71.5km still to go, quickly catching and passing the last remaining breakaway rider, Fredrik Dversnes.