Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard (from right) leave all the competition behind in the mountains of the Tour de France.
Foto: imago/Panoramic International
Phew, Tadej Pogačar hasn’t been seen this exhausted since he showed up at the pro cyclists’ circus. He took a deep breath after crossing the finish line in Cauterets on Thursday. He gasped for air for a long time. And his radiant smile, which the Slovene usually likes to wear so much, does not yet want to penetrate the exhaustion that characterizes his features. He had given everything on this 6th stage of the Tour de France to arrive as the winner of the first mountain finish of this Tour of France. He also had to give everything. “Jumbo-Visma set a very hard pace on the Col du Tourmalet. I thought the drama of the day before would be repeated. I was really worried,” he later said of the attack by his greatest adversary.
Tom on tour
Tom Mustroph, cycling author and
Doping expert, reports for the 22nd time
for “nd” from the Tour de France.
On Wednesday, Jonas Vingegaard, driving like unleashed, took more than a minute from him. The Dane’s team-mates had prepared the attack impressively there too, with Wout van Aert, Wilco Kelderman and Sepp Kuss in the first place. For Vingegaard it was still a pursuit. Because Jai Hindley had driven ahead of him. With a bit of luck, the Australian slipped into the breakaway group of the day. “I didn’t intend to do that at all,” Hindley explained later. »But behind me the gap has opened. And then I thought to myself: I’ll just have a nice race.« He finally got the day’s victory in Laruns for the Bora team and also the yellow jersey. A tailor-made day for the German racing team.
A half day for Vingegaard and Jumbo-Visma, however. “Yes, that’s right, for us it was only a half-successful day,” said Arthur van Dongen, Jumbo’s sporting director of the “nd”. “We gained time on an opponent, on Pogačar. But we had to let someone else go.« And after the 5th and before the 6th stage, Hindley named another competitor »whom we have to watch out for«.
24 hours later this duty was almost done again. The Dutch team picked up the pace again, a very hard one, as Pogačar said. Then captain Vingegaard continued the preliminary work and attacked. Only Pogačar could follow him. Hindley only tried that for a few hundred yards at the Tourmalet. Then he too had to acknowledge the superiority of the two overdrivers of the past few years and let himself fall back into the field of pursuers.
For Pogačar and Vingegaard, the hunt for jerseys and champagne bottles was now on. But while the Slovene was looking for signs of exhaustion – after all, he had already shown weaknesses the day before – he only shook his still not healed wrist for a moment and then launched such a brutal attack that Vingegaard was literally dusted off the road blew in the face.
Pogačar won the stage in great fashion. “I don’t want to say that it was an act of revenge,” he referred to the previous day at the finish. “But of course it’s good to have won and made up some time,” he said. ‘I’m feeling a little better now. And I just caught the right moment to attack,” analyzed the still only 24-year-old Slovenian, who is riding in the white jersey of the best young professional on the tour. A few sentences later he even felt like joking. ‘Mark, I’m coming,’ he said jokingly to Mark Cavendish. He still holds the record of 34 daily victories together with Eddy Merckx. The victory at Cauterets was Pogačar’s tenth stage win in a Tour de France.
Opponent Vingegaard, who has so far been empty-handed this year and has only two stage victories in the »mother of all tours« to his credit, could at least be happy about the yellow jersey. “It’s just nice to have it back,” said last year’s Tour winner. He still has a 25-second lead over Pogačar at the end of the Pyrenees. Hindley is further behind at 1:34 minutes, all other pursuers are more than three minutes behind.
The next showdown is on Sunday at the Puy de Dome stage. This is feared not only because of the steep finale with ramps of more than 12 percent gradient, but also because the roads are not always entirely smooth. Pogačar’s wrist, which was broken in April, should then be subjected to very special hardships. The material could also make a difference. Because sometimes the streets are so narrow that not even the cars with the spare wheels on the roof fit through. “We have to switch to motorcycles,” said Bruno Mallet, head of the neutral material service, looking ahead to Sunday.
For all the other drivers behind the outstanding duo from Slovenia and Denmark it is all about keeping up as long as possible. “They’re in a league of their own. But the battle for third place is extremely open,” said Rod Ellingworth, Team Ineos manager. Bora professional Jai Hindley still has the best cards. “But we’re still doing pretty well with fifth and ninth place.”
Ellingworth was referring to young Spanish hopeful Carlos Rodríguez and British off-road specialist Tom Pidcock. This is an insider tip that is not so rarely mentioned for the day’s victory on Sunday. The Yates twins Simon (4th) and Adam (6th), who had shaped the start of the tour with their double victory, are also cheerfully present. Adam is actually Team UAE’s back-up for Pogačar should he fail to hold his wrist. But so far it’s looking good. And especially the legs.
