As the finish line approached on Friday, Tadej Pogacar looked over his shoulder and saw an empty road. Moments later, he was a giant step closer to clinching a third Tour de France title by winning another tough mountain stage.
Pogacar pulled away from Jonas Vingegaard to be 5 minutes, 3 seconds ahead of his main rival with two days left.
“Now I have a good lead,” Pogacar said. “I will do the last two days of the Tour on the roads where I have trained my entire professional career.”
Photo: AP
The Slovenian looked almost certain to reclaim the Tour crown from Vingegaard, the two-time defending champion from Denmark, and in doing so secure the Giro d’Italia and Tour de France double.
Behind a fading Vingegaard sat Tour debutant Remco Evenepoel of Belgium, who was 7 minutes, 1 second adrift in third place.
Pogacar attacked with about 9km left on the final climb of 16km to the Isola 2000 ski resort. Vingegaard could not follow as Pogacar chased after the Dane’s Jumbo Visma teammate, Matteo Jorgenson.
Photo: AFP
The American rider was alone in front with Richard Carapaz and Simon Yates just behind him.
Carapaz and Yates were caught by Pogacar, leaving just Jorgenson ahead. He was overtaken with 2km left as the UAE Team Emirates leader soared to his fourth stage win this month — holding up four fingers to the fans — and 15th Tour stage victory of his career.
“As I approached the last 2 kilometers, I felt a little drained. I still caught Richard Carapaz and Simon Yates, and I could catch up with Matteo Jorgenson,” Pogacar said. “When it was time to pass him, I pushed as hard as possible to overtake him with speed. He was very strong today, as were all the guys in the breakaway. Hats off to them.”
After four hours in the saddle, Pogacar raised both hands in the air as he crossed the line. Jorgensen was 21 seconds behind and Yates 40 seconds back in third. Carapaz was 1 minute, 11 seconds back in fourth.
“I knew today’s last climb very well. With the team, we planned it well and we did exactly as we said,” Pogacar said. “Our race was 100 percent perfect.”
Evenepoel placed fifth ahead of a disconsolate Vingegaard, with both riders timed at 1 minute, 42 seconds behind Pogacar.
The Tour ends today on the French Riviera with a time trail from Monaco to Nice, and not in Paris as it usually does because of the Olympic Games.
Taiwan’s men’s A team last night defeated their counterpart B team 82-77 in their first showdown in the William Jones Cup at New Taipei City’s Sinjhuang Gymnasium. With four wins under their belt, Taiwan’s A squad — also known as the blue team, consisting of the national team’s main roster — lead the tournament, while Malaysia and the Philippines Strong Group-Pilipinas, who were not scheduled to play last night, are both undefeated with three wins each. Taiwanese-American teenager Robert Hinton, playing in his first William Jones Cup, led the scoring early in the first quarter, putting up nine points for the A
A chance encounter during a drunken night out was the unlikely catalyst for breaker Sunny Choi’s journey to the Paris Olympic Games. The 35-year-old American is to showcase her skills before a global audience in Paris when breaking makes its debut on the Olympic stage. Choi is the beneficiary of efforts to attract younger fans to the Olympics, a move that led to breaking’s inclusion for the first time. However, as Choi says, the Olympics was the last thing on her mind when she took up the sport. A freshman student at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, Choi stumbled into breaking
Former NFL receiver Jacoby Jones, whose 108-yard kickoff return in 2013 remains the longest touchdown in Super Bowl history, has died at the age of 40. The Houston Texans, Jones’ team for the first five seasons of his career, announced his death on Sunday. In a statement released by the NFL Players Association, his family said he died at his home in New Orleans. A cause of death was not given. Jones played from 2007 to 2015 for the Texans, Baltimore Ravens, San Diego Chargers and Pittsburgh Steelers, and he made several huge plays for the Ravens during their most recent Super
Teenage gymnast Shoko Miyata has been pulled from Japan’s team for the Paris Olympics after being caught smoking and drinking, officials said yesterday. The 19-year-old, a world bronze medalist and captain of Japan’s women’s gymnastics team for the Games, was sent home from their training camp in Monaco and admitted she had violated the squad’s code of conduct. “With her confirmation and after discussions on all sides, it has been decided that she will withdraw from the Olympics,” Japan Gymnastics Association (JGA) secretary-general Kenji Nishimura told reporters in Tokyo. Nishimura said the association had been told that Miyata was seen smoking in a