Remco Evenepoel takes first ever Tour de France win on stage 7 time trial but Tadej Pogacar holds onto the Maillot Jaune
CyclingFriday, 05 July 2024 at 17:29
After a thriller of a time trial, the titans of the 2024 Tour de France went head to head against the clock with Remco Evenepoel proving strongest, gaining time on the likes of Tadej Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard and Primoz Roglic.
The first time trial of the 2024 Tour de France, the record breaking, history making Mark Cavendish was the first man down the start ramp in Nuits-Saint-Georges. The Astana Qazaqstan Team sprinter just about managed to be the first rider across the finish line too, narrowly finishing ahead of teammate Michael Morkov, although it was Morkov who had the faster time of the duo.
Of the early riders, by the far the quickest proved to be Groupama - FDJ's Lenny Martinez. The Frenchman clocked 31:40 when he crossed the line, 59 seconds quicker than anyone else who finished their efforts to that point. The next man into the hotseat was Luke Dudbridge, although the Australian wasn't able to get too comfortable as first Nils Politt and then Stefan Bissegger went ever quicker. The Swiss rider having the new benchmark time of 30:06.
Whilst Bissegger's effort looked like ensuring a relatively lengthy stay in the hotseat for the Swiss, Kevin Vauquelin had other ideas. The Frenchman, who has already taken a victory on stage 2, became the first rider to go under 30 minutes with his time of 29:44. After spending a fair while as stage leader, Vauquelin was eventually narrowly unseated as Victor Campenaerts went less than a second quicker.
Stefan Kung then looked as if he would threaten the time of Campenaerts. Mid-ride though, the Groupama - FDJ time trial specialists saw his chain slip off momentarily. A potentially key factor in denying Kung the new fastest time as he crossed the line 8 seconds down on Campenaerts. Wout van Aert gave it a go, but was nearly a minute slower than his compatriot at the line.
Julien Bernard, riding on home roads was given a hero's welcome by a legion of his supporters on the day's only climb. It was Ben Healy, who was the next rider to threaten the Lotto Dstny man in the hotseat. Fading somewhat in the final run in however, the Irishman eventually finished 7 seconds down. Derek Gee also made a solid effort, stopping the clock 25 seconds behind Campenaerts. When the big four of Primoz Roglic, Jonas Vingegaard, Remco Evenepoel and Tadej Pogacar took to the course however, Campenaerts was still in the hotseat.
As soon as the big 4 were on the course however, the timings were almost immediately turning green, making it unlikely Campenaerts would be able to hold onto the stage win. At the first time check, Evenepoel was the fastest, 2 seconds clear of Pogacar, 10 to Vingegaard and 20 to Roglic. At the second check, Evenepoel had increased his lead over Pogacar to 10 seconds, 23 seconds ahead of Vingegaard and 37 seconds faster than Roglic.
Crossing the line, Roglic took the provisional lead, over 17 seconds quicker than Campenaerts. The stage win wasn't forthcoming for the BORA - hansgrohe leader however, despite Vingegaard dropping to 3 seconds slower. There was then a moment of concern for Evenepoel as the Belgian suffered a minor mechanical with just over 2km to go. Nevertheless, he crossed the line in the provisional lead, 34 seconds quicker than Roglic. Would the gear problems prove fatal for the stage win though? As it turned out, no. Pogacar crossed the line 12 seconds down, missing out on the stage but keeping yellow.
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- To me it seems like she wanted to take a step closer but she hadn’t noticed the level was lower and as she tried to look down to understand the unexpected movement in her leg her balance continued forward and then she tried to find footing to stop the movement but there was none left so down she went, silly fart. Hope that girl in the red jersey was ok, didn’t seem to react well.Mistermaumau07-05-2025
- and Mc Nulty....
maria2024202407-05-2025 - mmmmm... AYUSO, Adam, AYUSO, Mc nulty, AYUSO.... UAE without the clear POgacar leadership could be a mess.... we'll see...maria2024202407-05-2025
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Why was Remco not in his World ITT Champion's colors?
I still haven't watched it yet, will do that tonight. I can't believe Wout was so far off. Good on Primoz and obviously Remco and Pogi.
Sensational ride from Remco and I think we can definitely see the Giro reflected in Pogacar's legs...
That said, his MJ defense was stellar and eliminating Remco in the high mountains will be priority 1AA for UAE, because he is faaar too dangerous to be in the MJ mix in Nice.
And then there was Jonas Vingegaard.
This man crashed in Spain on April 4, fracturing ribs, a collarbone and blowing a hole in his lung.
He was FLAT ON HIS BACK for 12 DAYS until April 16
Then he had 21 MORE DAYS of only gentle and very calmly progressive indoor training and physio work until he was permitted to ride his bike outdoors on May 7th...
And then he had to ease his way back into his normal training cadence, probably was not back to full, World Tour level, top professional training loads until say June 1... Which is already super aggressive for a man coming back from an ICU stay and a popped lung...
And here he is, 4-5 weeks later on July 5th losing 37 seconds to the current TT (and former RR) World Champ who is on MONSTER form...
Say what you want about Remco, but that man sacrificed his national champs to train at altitude and has been focused on this stage for MONTHS and was training at the HIGHEST PROFESSIONAL LEVEL the entire time Jonas was injured...
So Visma wants me to believe that Jonas can take a month completely off the bike and still be top 4 in a rolling non-mountain, high stakes TdF time trial after 4-6weeks of training????
Meanwhile, last year Tadej misses what? 10 days of outdoor training time from his wrist injury, races a magnificent TT and Jonas smoked him by over a Minute...
How stupid does Visma think we are???
There are only two options to describe this...
Either Jonas has the ability to recover from life-threatening physical injury like Deadpool or Wolverine, giving him a capacity that we have never seen before in the history of cycling....
Or this is exactly what we have seen time and again in cycling. Visma is using some combination of TUEs, loopholes, grey areas, dicey rule application or just some new-new mods and/or some super sexy, super secret new-new-NEW performance enhancers...
There is no other possible way that Jonas can make up for make up for 30-45+ days of LOST high level, professional grade racing and training from serious injury to be ready for the TdF...
Last years TT from Jonas was questionable at best. This display is a complete joke...
I applaud Visma for their innovation and creativity to find ways to make Jonas perform at this level so quickly after such a devastating injury...
I however do not believe ANYTHING That Jonas does in this race is legit... it is entirely likely that He is on something that the others are not...
This performance speaks for itself...
He also weighs 8 pounds less than he did at last year's TDF. Complete bullshit. We're watching a lie.
Spot on comments his TT power output last year was almost the same as Indurain during his peak powers.watch thenetflix series even the DS in car following Vin jaws drop with amazement after the TT win against Pog. Must be good baking soda🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Jonas is trolling all of us and assuming that we are all idiots who believe in Disney stories and who did not live through Gewiss, Pantani, Armstrong, Landis and Ricco...
What Jonas is doing is either a miracle or he is on performance enhancers...
And as I have said before, there are NO MIRACLES in cycling...
What an absolute joke Jonas is... It compromises the integrity of an otherwise amazing Tour...
It's definitely eye raising comparing Jonas even to his own teammate Wout, who crashed earlier than Jonas with less severe injuries but is much further off his top form. The other possibility is that Jonas' training was focused largely on high intensity efforts of 5-20 minutes, but his base is lacking which will show in the 3rd week. We even saw he faded dramatically in the second half of the TT, and was so shattered after trying to follow Pog over the Galibier that he lost 2 seconds in the sprint to the other favorites after they caught him on the descent. I don't think he'll "ride into better form" as the Tour progresses and as we've seen in the past. Rather, his foundation deteriorated with his time off, and that takes longer to rebuild than explosiveness, and he will collapse in the final week if not sooner.
If that doesn't happen, then there is no doubt that he is on something the other riders are not.
Good for Victor C a former triathlete. Great for Remco. Roglic did well. How did Pogacar lose that time at the end of his ride?
UAE is an incredible team in the mountains. They still could finish 1,2,3 if Remco cracks or Roglic crashes. The sprint teams will do the work on sprint days so UAE is in control of this race.
Ayuso got spanked. Time for him check his ego and be a team player.
Bravo. That was riveting.