RIMINI, Italy >> Two-time podium finisher Romain Bardet won the opening stage of the Tour de France and claimed the yellow jersey for the first time on Saturday.

Combined with severe heat, one of the most challenging opening legs in recent memory created problems for Mark Cavendish and many other riders as cycling’s biggest race began in Italy for the first time.

Tadej Pogacar, who is aiming to follow up his Giro d’Italia title with a third Tour trophy, and two-time defending champion Jonas Vingegaard both finished safely in the main pack, though.

Vingegaard’s performance was especially encouraging, considering he was hospitalized for nearly two weeks in April following a high-speed crash in the Tour of the Basque Country. He sustained a broken collarbone and ribs and a collapsed lung and had not raced since.

Bardet, the Frenchman who finished second in 2016 and third in 2017 and is racing his last Tour, attacked with slightly more than 50 kilometers (30 miles) to go.

He caught up with his DSM-Firmenich PostNL teammate Frank van den Broek, who was in an early breakaway, and the pair just barely held off the onrushing peloton in the flat finish.

Bardet surged ahead of his teammate at the line and pointed to him to say, “Thank you.”

“It’s crazy. I didn’t know the course particularly well but Frank was really, really strong out in front and then I felt that I had nothing to lose,” Bardet said of his rookie teammate, who was riding his first ever Tour stage. “He really deserves this win just as much as me, because he did all of the work.”

It was Bardet’s fourth career stage win in the Tour, and first since 2017. He had never worn the yellow jersey before.