Lance Armstrong on why Jonas Vingegaard has very low chances of winning the Tour de France: "This is not the Visma of other years"

Lance Armstrong, who was highly critical of Tadej Pogacar and UAE Team Emirates for the tactics used on the Le Lioran stage, was for a change, full of praise for what they did on the Pla d'Adet.

"The tactics were good. They controlled the race, they controlled the breakaway, they have Adam Yates, they have those kind of riders. Adam Yates attacked and then Tadej," Armstrong said on his podcast The Move.

The Texan believes that the small details, the little "clues" that they leave each other in the middle of the decisive climb, determine the attacks they make, and that perhaps Pogacar saw a weakness in Vingegaard yesterday in the last kilometers and took advantage of it to attack.

"These guys know each other very well, they've been together a long time, I'm talking about Pogacar and Vingegaard, they know each other perfectly and any detail they detect, like the way sweat or salt builds up, maybe they sneeze or maybe they're uncomfortable on the bike, they see it and we can't see that sitting on a couch listening to a commentator, they who are glued together see those things."

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It is clear that Pogacar's 2-minute lead is now a considerable advantage to be reckoned with: "This somewhat hypothetical, you send Jorgenson to the lead to set a pace. and we've seen this in the past and Jorgenson's pace seemed conservative, but imagine a world where Vingegaard tells him to slow down some, if Pogacar listens to him he has to attack, this is hypothetical, they didn't talk about it. Now with a 2 minute lead. It's a big advantage going into the time trial," he refers to the test against the clock the organisers prepared for the last stage in Nice. However we still have handful hard stages up ahead and it may not be within 'just' two minutes next Sunday.

Armstrong would like to see Vingegaard's team to approach the race more aggressively: "This Visma | Lease a Bike is not what it was in the past. They have great riders and have had bad luck with crashes and losing Sepp Kuss before the race, but Matteo Jorgenson can't do all the work to reopen the race, he has to have guys in the lead to be able to hurt Pogacar."

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Article written by Juan Larra.