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"It is very accurate" - Jonas Vingegaard confirms that unbelievable W/Kg on Plateau de Beille are true
CyclingWednesday, 17 July 2024 at 10:51
Stage 15 of the Tour de France had almost 5000 meters of climbing and was raced at a very high pace from start to finish. Hence, after climbing Plateau de Beille in less than 40 minutes, a whole 3:44 minutes faster than Marco Pantani in 1998, a whole conversation began on the unreal watts that were pushed by Tadej Pogacar but also his rivals. Jonas Vingegaard confirms that the estimates are 'very accurate'.
As soon as the stage finished, several analysts stopped the timer and quickly confirmed the unreal pace that was ridden on the Pyrenean climb. Pogacar raced up the 16-kilometer climb in 39 minutes and 44 seconds; Jonas Vingegaard in 40 minutes and 52 seconds; Remco Evenepoel in 42 minutes and 35 seconds... And the previous record of Marco Pantani was of 43:28 - a similar time to that of fourth place Mikel Landa.
Behind were times of riders such as Lance Armstrong in 45:40 (2004), Jelle Vanendert who won stage in 2011 with 46:26 and the GC group including Chris Froome back in 2015 with 45:39 - six minutes slower than Sunday's time by Pogacar. It was estimated that Pogacar pushed 6.98W/Kg for the whole climb, unseen numbers in the world of cycling.
Pogacar's time up the climb itself was aided by the monstrous work of Matteo Jorgenson and Jonas Vingegaard. The latter also put in his career-best performance up the ascent, said to have averaged 6.85W/Kg for over 40 minutes.
"...The others on the team said that someone has estimated how many watts per kilo we have stepped on. To put it bluntly, it is very accurate," Vingegaard said in words to TV2 Denmark. "Of course I don't know what they rode in the old days, but it's at least the best I've ever ridden".
There is no question on whether this ride is one for the history books, at least for the time being, it is possible that more will happen in the coming days. It is palpable the evolution in climbing performance in cycling, which does not stop growing due to the constant evolution in technology, nutrition and training methods ahead of what is the biggest race in the calendar.
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