"For Jonas Vingegaard to turn this around is going to get harder and harder" - Cadel Evans 'amazed' by Tadej Pogacar at 2024 Tour de France

The 2024 Tour de France was one of the most hotly anticipated in a long while pre race and now 14 stages in, it's fair to say the Grand Tour has more than lived up to the hype with Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard going head to head and Remco Evenepoel holding his own as an intriguing third party.

The 2011 Tour de France winner Cadel Evans knows what it takes to secure overall victory of the Maillot Jaune and the Australian has been left very impressed by what he has witnessed so far. With stage 15 concluding on top of Plateau de Beille, Evans also has fond memories of that particular climb.

"It's funny coming back here because not that many years have passed but it's a lot easier coming up it in a car that's for sure!" Evans laughs in preview of the stage for ITV Sport. "Like everyone I'm watching Pog and I'm just amazed. We knew Pog was the greatest talent riding a bike on the planet at the moment, but then seeing days like yesterday, when I'm thinking he might pay for his efforts, but then he does an attack like that, pulls it off and just takes more and more time. For Vingegaard to turn this around is going to get harder and harder."

With 14 stages down, Pogacar now holds a 1:57 advantage over Vingegaard in the general classification following his second stage win of the race. "I think Sepp Kuss' absence is an interesting point," Evans assesses. "Unfortunately for Vingegaard, it's changed the dynamic of this race. But most of all I look at the times and Pog rode up the climb way faster than anyone has ever ridden it! Vingegaard set a new record as well but it's just not good enough against Pogacar."

"I had two occasions where I tried a Giro/Tour double," continues Evans, referencing Pogacar's current quest for another piece of cycling history. "On both occasions for me, things went wrong health wise or injury wise. Most of all though, in modern cycling the importance of the Tour de France is just so much, that you don't think about doing anything else that could compromise your chances."