Heading into the Tour de France, had you offered Jonas Vingegaard the position in the general classification he currently holds at the first rest day, he surely would have taken it. Given what has happened on the past two mountain stages however, it would be understandable if the Dane was disappointed.
“It would have been nicer to gain than lose time on Tadej Pogacar but as I said before, I came to the Tour knowing that the first week suited me less than what’s to come, so to be in the yellow jersey at the end of the first week satisfies me," the Jumbo-Visma leader summarised in his post-stage 9 interview.
Pogacar took back eight seconds on Vingegaard on stage 9, meaning last year's Tour de France winner holds a slim advantage of only 17 seconds at the first rest day. "I felt quite OK today, however Tadej was again a little bit better," Vingegaard laments. "Today, we didn’t want to go for the stage win, however, hadn’t we controlled, the gap would have been 40 minutes and we would have had to ride at some point anyways."
With plenty of climbing still to come at the 2023 Tour de France, Vingegaard is keen to bounce back once the race restarts. "It was a very hard but very nice experience to race up to Puy de Dôme and I’m looking forward to the Alps.”
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