Tadej Pogačar took full control of the Men’s Tour de Romandie on stage 4, winning alone in Charmey after a brutal series of accelerations on the final ascent of the Jaunpass. UAE Team Emirates-XRG had already shaped much of the week, but this was the day the race was properly broken apart, with Pogačar riding clear of the rest of the general classification contenders and stretching his overall lead.
Stage 4 ran 149.6km from Broc to Charmey and packed repeated climbing into a deceptively short route. Jaunpass was climbed from both sides before the final drag to the line, and the constant changes in rhythm made it a stage that wore the field down long before the decisive move arrived.
Florian Lipowitz was the only rider able to stay close for longest, limiting his losses to finish second at 14 seconds. Behind him, a much larger chase group came home nearly two minutes later, with Pablo Castrillo taking third on the stage ahead of Lorenzo Fortunato. The result doubled Pogačar’s overall advantage over Lipowitz from 17 seconds to 35 seconds, while Lenny Martinez remained third overall but slipped further back.
A short stage that offered no real rest
This was always one of the key days of the race, even without the pure summit finish drama of the final stage to Leysin. The route from Broc to Charmey was built around repetition and climbing pressure rather than one single knockout blow. Jaunpass appeared twice before the peloton later returned to the harder side again in the finale, while Saanenmöser added another layer of fatigue in the middle of the day.
That proved to be exactly how it played out. UAE Team Emirates-XRG kept the day under control and made sure the race came to the final ascent with the main contenders already under pressure. Pogačar had already won stages 1 and 2, then watched Dorian Godon take stage 3, but the queen stage gave him the terrain to race on pure climbing force rather than tactics or timing alone.
Pogačar turns the screw on the final Jaunpass
The winning move was not one clean acceleration. Instead, Pogačar softened the field with repeated changes of pace on the final category 1 ascent of the Jaunpass. Each surge stripped another rider away from the front group until only Lipowitz remained close enough to offer any resistance.
That in itself said plenty about the German’s ride, because no one else could hold the same level once Pogačar really committed. The elastic finally snapped just over a kilometre from the summit. Pogačar got rid of Lipowitz, created the gap he had been searching for, and then kept pressing on over the top rather than hesitating.
It was not a huge advantage at first, but it was enough. From there he descended cleanly to Charmey and never looked like giving the others a route back into the stage.
Lipowitz still deserves a lot of credit for the way he handled the climb. He could not match the decisive acceleration, but he still rode strongly enough to finish clear of the rest and strengthen his grip on second overall. On a day when most of the field lost serious time, he limited the damage better than anyone else.
The rest were left racing for the podium places
Behind the leading pair, the stage gradually turned into a battle for survival and then for places. The GC group splintered under the repeated climbing and the final selection never had the cohesion to make inroads once Pogačar was gone. By the time the chase swelled on the descent and run-in, the stage win had long disappeared up the road.
Castrillo timed his effort best from that larger group to take third on the stage, edging Fortunato at the line. It was a sharp finish to a difficult day, but the key point was the time gap. Nearly two minutes had been conceded to Pogačar by that group, which underlined just how hard he had hit the race on the climb.
That reshaped the overall standings as much as the stage result itself. Pogačar now has real breathing room in yellow, Lipowitz is clearly established as his nearest challenger, and the rest are already a long way back with only one road stage left. Martinez still sits third overall, but the time loss on stage 4 means he is now fighting more to stay on the podium than to challenge for the top step.
How the race was won
The key to the day was not simply that Pogačar attacked, but where and how he did it. Stage 4 was designed to reward a rider who could cope with constant climbing and then still produce repeated surges deep into the race. Rather than waiting until the final few hundred metres, he used the hardest climbing to turn the group inside out and then forced everyone else into their own limits.
It also mattered that he committed over the top. On some mountain stages the strongest rider gets separation on the climb but then stalls slightly on the descent or flatter run-in. Here, Pogačar kept the pressure on, which meant Lipowitz never had the chance to regroup and the larger chase never had a realistic opportunity to organise behind.
The result was a stage win that looked familiar in one sense, Pogačar alone and everyone else scattered behind, but it was also an important one in the shape of this race. Romandie had stayed relatively close behind him until now. Stage 4 was the moment where that changed.
Men’s Tour de Romandie 2026 Stage 4 result
Results powered by FirstCycling.com
Main photo credit: Cor Vos
