Tour de France 2022: Michael Matthews wins stage 14 in Mende – as it happened

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Stage 14 report: Having been overtaken on the final climb, Michael Matthews drew on his apparently bottomless reserves to pull clear of Alberto Bettiol and win his first stage of the Tour de France since 2017.

Updated at 11.56 EDT

Caleb Ewan finishes the stage …

With the broom wagon on his back wheel, the Australian limps over the line over 39 minutes after his compatriot Michael Matthews. He punches the air in weary triumph, which suggests he’s made it inside the time limit. Well done him!

Top 10 on GC after stage 14

Updated at 11.49 EDT

Michael Matthews speaks …

“I think it’s pretty much the story of my career,” says the stage winner. “I’ve had so many rollercoasters up and down but my wife and my daughter kept believing me. How many times have I been smashed down but I always get back up. This was for my daughter today; she’s four years old and I really just wanted to show her why I’m away all the time and what I do it for. And today was that day.”

Team Bikeexchange-Jayco’s Michael Matthews savours his win as he stands on the podium. Photograph: Anne-Christine Poujoulat/AFP/Getty Images

Updated at 12.24 EDT

Caleb Ewan watch: We don’t know how far behind the Australian is but we he is the last of 111 riders still out on the road today.

Geraint Thomas: The Welsh Ineos Grenadiers rider remains in third place overall at 2min 43sec.

Louis Meintjes: Having started the day in 14th place on General Classification and at one point pedalled his way to virtual second, the South African finishes an excellent day’s work in seventh place overall.

Pogacar and Vingegaard roll over the finsh line. More than 12 minutes after Michael Matthews won the stage, the Slovenian is first over with the race leader on his wheel.

Visma’s Jonas Vingegaard (rear) and UAE Team Emirates’ Tadej Pogacar cross the finish line. Photograph: Christian Hartmann/Reuters

Updated at 11.37 EDT

Pogacar attacks again: The Slovenian puts in another big dig with two kilometres to to go. He’s unable to give Vingegaard the slip. The duo are taking huge chunks of time out of David Gaudu, Thomas and Bardet.

Oof! Pogacar and Vingegaard power up the final climb leaving the rest of the GC contenders in all sorts of bother. Geraint Thomas has lost 30 seconds, while Romain Bardet has lost 46.

The yellow jersey group: Jonas Vingegaard has been left isolated in a group of about 15 riders on the final climb. Tadaj Pogacar launches an attack but the race leader sticks to his back wheel.

Louis Meintjes. Having started the day in 14th place on GC, the South African finished the stage 1min 13sec behind Michael Matthews. He won’t be getting the yellow jersey following his brilliant performance but could get in the top five.

Michael Matthews wins stage 14!

The Australian wins his first stage of the Tour for five years following a courageous masterclass in bike-riding. It was a heroic effort from him today. Alberto Bettiol takes second place and Thibaut Pinot is third.

Stage winner Michael Matthews celebrates as he crosses the finish line. Photograph: Daniel Cole/AP The celebrations continue after Matthews dismounts. Photograph: Guillaume Horcajuelo/Reuters

Updated at 11.40 EDT

1km to go: Astonishing stuff from Matthews, who looked beaten but digs deep into his reserves of strength to overtake Bettiol and be first over the final climb. He’ll be favourite to win the runway sprint to the finish.

2km to go: Bettiol leads Matthews by about seven bike-lengths but can’t shake them off. Thibaut Pinot is chasing them down but looks to have let it too late.

2.3km to go: Bettiol latches on to Matthews’ wheel and then passes the Australian in a bid to win his first Tour de France stage. Matthews hangs on but is deep in the red zone.

3km to go: Michael Matthews pulls clear of Sanchez and Grosschartner, whose collective goose looks cooked. This is a heroic effort from the Australian, who has already finished second in two stages on this Tour. He’s about to be caught by Alberto Bettiol with the gradient on the final climb at its steepest.

Spectators cheer Michael Matthews of Team BikeExchange – Jayco as he attacks in the breakaway. Photograph: Michael Steele/Getty Images

Updated at 11.14 EDT

4km to go: There are 2.5km to the top of the final climb and the lead of the trio in front is down to 16 seconds. Michael Woods is putting in a shift in the chasing group on behalf of his Israel–Premier Tech teammate Jakob Fuglsang.

5km to go: Matthews, Sanchez and Grosschartner pass under the “five kilomtres to go” banner and into the final kilometre before the vicious final climb with it’s maximum gradient of 15%. They have a lead of 24 seconds over a chasing group that includes Simmons, Pinot, Martinez, Woods and Uran.

6km to go: The leaders approach the foot of the Côte de la Croix Neuve Montée Jalabert, recently re-named in honour of Laurent Jalabert. Hmmm …

10km to go: At the front of the race, Michael Matthews (BikeExchange-Jayco), Luis Leon Sanchez (Bahrain-Victorious) and Felix Grosschartner (Bora-Hansgrohe) have a lead of 39 seconds over a chasing group being led by Thibaut Pinot (Groupama-FDJ).

11 min: Wout van Aert is leading the yellow jersey group featuring all the big names with his team-mate, the race leader Jonas Vingegaard on his back wheel. He’ll lead them to the foot of the final climb before dropping off, one suspects.

Jumbo-Visma’s yellow jersey holder Jonas Vingegaard is on the wheel of team-mate Wout Van Aert, who is sporting the sprinter’s green jersey. Photograph: Marco Bertorello/AFP/Getty Images

Updated at 11.18 EDT

13km to go: Tom Pidcock is droipped from the yellow jersey group and looks set to drop out of the top 10 on GC. At the front of the race, Michael Matthews (BikeExchange-Jayco), Luis Leon Sanchez (Bahrain-Victorious) and Felix Grosschartner (Bora-Hansgrohe) have a lead of 39 seconds over the chasing posse as they descend from Cote de la Fage. With a very steep climb to come before the finish, will it be enough?

Caleb Ewan watch: The Australian and his three comrades from Lotto Soudal are over 26 minutes behind the stage leaders.

20km to go: Back in an increasingly small peloton, Team Jumbo-Visma are putting the hammer down, presumably in order to stop Louis Meintjes from taking the yellow jersey.

25km to go: If Lotto Soudal didn’t have bad luck they’d have no luck at all. In the wake of Caleb Ewan’s crash yesterday, Andreas Kron has been dropped from the lead quartet after his front tyre punctured. He did well to stay iupright as it happened on a downhill stretch as he approached a turn. Elsewhere, Simon Geschke has mathematically guaranteed himself the King of the Mountains jersey for another day at least.

31km to go: Michael Matthews (BikeExchange-Jayco), Luis Leon Sanchez (Bahrain-Victorious), Andreas Kron (Lotto Soudal), Felix Grosschartner (Bora-Hansgrohe) have a lead of 29 seconds. In the chasing pack, Louis Meintjes (Intermarché–Wanty–Gobert Matériaux) has ridden himself into second place on the virtual GC leaderboard. The gap to the peloton is a staggering 14min 30sec!

Updated at 10.32 EDT

32km to go: Neilson Powless, Bauke Mollema and Michael Woods are dropped from the original breakaway.

33km to go: The Italian rider Alberto Bettiol is trying to bridge the gap to the four leaders and is shedding assorting travel companions. He’s in an eight-man group trying to hunt down the four leaders. Stefan Kung is dropped, which is bad news for his Groupama–FDJ team-mate Thibaut Pinot.

36km to go: Matthews, Grosschartner, Kron and Sanchez have a 41-second lead over the other 19 riders from the breakaway.

38km to go: The gap from the leaders to the peloton is now out to 13min 23sec, which means South African rider Louis Meintjes is being catapulted up the GC rankings. Having started this morning in 15th place overall with a 15min 46sec deficit, he could end up in the yellow jersey!!!

Updated at 10.17 EDT

39km to go: Matthews remains on his own in front with a slender lead over a chasing trio of Andreas Kron, Felix Grosschartner and Luis Leon Sanchez. The remaining 19 members of the breakaway are now bickering amongst themselves over who should lead the chase. They’ve made a mess of this and with three men in the breakaway who missed the split, one suspects the directeur sportif of EF Education-Easypost is going to be spitting feathers.

46km to go: Michael Matthews is still out front on his own but only has a lead of 10 seconds over a chasing trio. The rest of the breakaway are a further 17seconds behind.

47km to go: A seven-rider chase group including Dani Martinez and Quinn Simmons set off in pursuit of Matthews, while behind them Stefan Kung takes his place at the front of the rest of the breakaway to time trial them back to the escapees.

The road into Chapeauroux. Photograph: Alex Broadway/Getty Images

Updated at 10.12 EDT

52km to go: Michael Matthews has attacked off the front of the breakaway. The Australian BikeExchange–Jayco rider they call “Bling” has opened a gap of 27 seconds in an optimistic bid to win the stage. A good climber but not a great one, it’s his only hope with two big climbs to come.

Updated at 10.38 EDT

57km to go: Simon Geschke sprints clear of Quinn Simmons to take the two KOM points available. The American was actually using the race to the summit of Cote de Grandieu to launch an attack, safe in the knowledge that nobody else would be contesting the sprint to the line. It’s a cunning plan in theory but doesn’t work in practice as Simmons is unable to shake off his pursuers.

Caleb Ewan watch: The Australian and his three Lotto Soudal amigos are 21 minutes behind the stage leaders. Hats off to Ewan, who I didn’t think had a hope in hell of finishing this stage. There’s a long way to go yet but he’s playing an absolute blinder in extremely trying circumstances.

59km to go: Among the busiest men on the race today, the lads on the Vittel motorbikes are doing commendably sterling work handing out bottles of water to thirsty riders from their refrigerated panniers.

62km to go: In the polka-dot jersey, Simon Geschke is reasonably near the front of the lead bunch as they approach the Col de Grandieu. Will anyone attempt to diddle him out of the maximum two points this time, as Quinn Simmons did earlier?

While Simmons is not in contention to win King of the Mountains, his Trek-Segafredo teammate Giulio Ciccone is. Ciccone is in the peloton today, so needs all the help he can get. Whgile it’s his job, Simmons is a very selfless rider, having put in an epic shift on the front of yesterday’s breakaway to help tee up Mads Pedersen for the win. WIth the Pyrenees ahoy, today he is tasked with trying to snaffle as many KOM points as possible so Geschke can’t get them.

71km to go: The gap is at 10min 34sec as the lead group pedal upwards towards the foot of the Cat 3 Côte de Grandrieu, which is 6.3km long, 1,131m high and 57km from the finish. After that, it’s steadily onwards and mostly upwards to the Cote de la Fage, a much steeper proposition at 4.2km, 1,442m and 30km from the finish. Both peaks are part of the same climb.

81km to go: “Thanks for doing the hard yards keeping an eye on the cycling today,” writes Rohan. “On the random fines for drafting, I can’t help feeling that the more I know about the family that own the Tour, the more it feels like fines are pretty much randomly distributed to make them money. See also the fines for going for a pee anywhere on route. Any views?”

I have no strong views but I think fining a visibly injured rider who’s just been in a bad crash for drafting as he tries to get back to the peloton is a bit harsh. While illegal, it’s unlikely that anyone would object if the commisaires turned a blind eye.

As for roadside ablutions – I’m not sure what the rules are regarding where and when riders are allowed to take a leak, but I suppose as long as they don’t go in the middle of a town or city and make efforts to avoid splashing any spectators’ roadside picnics, they should be allowed go discretely wherever they like.

Jumbo keeping on keeping on. Photograph: Rex/Shutterstock

Updated at 09.25 EDT

86km to go: The gap is out to 10min 28sec and there’s not much going on at the moment, the riders in both groups keeping their powder dry after a chaotic start to the stage, with a view to further battles nearer the end of the stage. The Caleb Ewan quartet of Lotto Soudal riders are currently 18 minutes off the pace.

As things stand we’re looking at a cut-off of about 30 minutes although the commisaires might take pity on the injured Ewan if he finishes outside it, due in no small part to him being a big name sprinter who they’ll want to see in the shake-up in Paris.

94km to go: There is a long, very steep climb just before the short, flat finish to today’s stage and on ITV, the commentary team of Ned Boulting, Pete Kennaugh and David Millar are suggesting that those in the breakaway will be hopeful of getting rid of Thibaut Pinot before they hit that final slope. As things stand, he’d be the favourite to win the stage but we can expect lots of attacks long before then.

95km to go: The gap between the 23-man breakaway and the peloton is now over 10 minutes.