Tadej Pogacar just couldn't help himself on stage 17 of the 2024 Tour de France. With the GC group seemingly content to roll in and save their legs for another day, the Maillot Jaune caught everyone by surprise with a brutal attack on the penultimate climb.
Although both Jonas Vingegaard and Remco Evenepoel eventually managed to get back to the UAE Team Emirates leader, with the latter even gaining 10 seconds by the line, Pogacar refuses to simply defend his over three minute lead in the general classification as the number of stages remaining continue to dwindle down.
“It’s one less day to go, and it has been a very good one indeed," reflects the Maillot Jaune in his post-stage interview. "It was a very fast stage - and it felt like a junior race for 120km! It turned out to be a very hard day, one of those on which you spend a lot of energy. Team Visma | Lease a Bike did a great race today, as they were very aggressive. I don’t know exactly if they wanted to trouble me, or stress us."
On his attack and the seemingly out of nowhere nature of the move, it seems even Pogacar was caught by surprise slightly. "Sometimes I don’t know the reason why I attack - even me, I don’t know anymore!" Pogacar laughs aloud. "I guess I was just enjoying the climb, as it was steep and super nice, and I felt like attacking to test my legs into this third week and see if I could get a gap or something. In the end, it was Remco who put in a super good attack and broke away. Without the Visma guys, he would have put even more time on Jonas and me,” concludes the UAE Team Emirates who managed to gain a further two seconds for his efforts over nearest challenger Vingegaard.
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