"I feel very good" - Richard Carapaz matches Pogacar, Vingegaard & Evenepoel on first GC test of 2024 Tour de France

Richard Carapaz showed some strong legs on the second stage of the 2024 Tour de France. The Ecuadorian from EF Education-EasyPost finished tenth, 2:21 behind the day's winner, Kevin Vauquelin, in a group with the big favourites with Tadej Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard and Remco Evenepoel.

Carapaz arrived with doubts after his crash in the fifth stage of the last Tour of Switzerland, which forced him to abandon and even put in doubt his participation in the Tour. But this good performance has given him a lot of confidence for what comes next.

"Yes, well, look, I think it has been a very hard year for me and I wanted to try this year and the truth is that it is going quite well. I think that after Switzerland I was a bit touched, I came with a strange down because I didn't know how I was going to feel. But I think today has been a good test for me," he assesses post stage. "The truth is that I feel very good and above all to see myself there fighting is good for my motivation because we know that there is still a very hard Tour ahead where there will still be many options."

"It was a very silly crash and then at the end they had to saturate me, so I got an infection and had to take antibiotics. I was like four days stopped without being able to ride a bike and it is very hard for the head because preparing for a Tour takes many months. In the end you can damage everything and for me it was very hard because, well, I came there without knowing how I could find myself. In the team they have given me a little free role and well look, in the end today has been as I said a good test for me, I feel very good. I hope to continue to find good feelings and to be able to climb little by little this Tour de France," Carapaz concludes.