Tadej Pogacar on Saturday won for a fifth time on this year’s Tour de France, moving to the brink of a third title, with an “out of this world” performance ahead of defending champion Jonas Vingegaard and Remco Evenepoel.
Two-time champion Pogacar had a 5-minute, 14-second lead over Vingegaard after Saturday, as he effectively made sure of becoming the first man in 26 years to capture the Giro d’Italia-Tour de France double in the same season.
It was a fifth stage victory this month for the two-time champion, who stretched out his arms as he crossed the line before holding up his fingers to signal his number of wins.
Photo: AFP
The only other man to have won five mountain stages in one Tour was Gino Bartali in 1948.
“Five wins. If you had told me that before the Tour then I would not have believed you,” Pogacar said. “It’s out of this world, I’m super happy.”
He rode most of the stage aided by teammates, likely to conserve energy for the last day.
“I wanted to ride and finish with the team,” he said, knowing he would finish alone in the final stage.
The Slovenian won the Tour de France in 2020 and 2021 before his attack-minded tactics backfired as Vingegaard beat him into second place in 2022 and last year.
The day’s action started in Nice and culminated on the tough Col de Couillole climb.
Evenepoel’s Soudal Quick-Step team set the tempo and attacked Vingegaard in an attempt to take second place overall.
Instead Evenepoel dropped about 53 seconds on the Dane, making it less likely the Belgian could claim second place after the time trial, where he is the favorite for the stage win.
Vingegaard said he had not been targeting a win on Saturday’s penultimate stage after admitting on Friday that his title hopes were over when Pogacar also pocketed the 19th stage.
“I was riding more to put more time into him [Evenepoel] rather than going for the stage today. He’s the best time trialist in the world so you never know,” the 27-year-old Dane said. “I felt really bad yesterday, completely empty, so to bounce back like this is really nice.”
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