"Pogačar was on a different level, he was better than Jonas, we have to accept it" Visma | Lease a Bike Sports Director, Grischa Niermann, reacted to Tadej Pogačar taking more time out of Jonas Vingegaard 🇩🇰 #TDF2024
"Today Tadej Pogacar was on a different level. He was better than Jonas Vingegaard" - Gricha Niermann reacts to disappointing day for Visma at Tour de France
CyclingSaturday, 13 July 2024 at 18:36
Things didn't exactly go to plan for Team Visma | Lease a Bike in the high mountains of stage 14 at the 2024 Tour de France. After Jonas Vingegaard's recent stage 11 win had given hope to a third successive Maillot Jaune win, the Dane was soundly defeated by Tadej Pogacar on Pla d'Adet this Saturday afternoon.
"We of course hoped for a different outcome," admits Team Visma | Lease a Bike sports director Grischa Niermann in his post-stage interview, outside the team bus. "But today Pogacar was on a different level. He was better than Jonas and we have to accept it."
Nevertheless, despite the time loss, Niermann is encouraged by Vingegaard's performance, with the Dane moving above Remco Evenepoel to second overall after the day. "Jonas did a good effort, he did his best, the best he could and he rode Remco out of his wheel," Niermann explains. "But in the end he lost quite a lot of time and we have to accept it like this. Today Tadej was better."
"Vingegaard himself did a really good effort on the final climb. Of course it's disappointing that he couldn't keep up with Tadej, that he couldn't compete for the victory but that's sports and we saw a great Tadej today," continues the Team Visma | Lease a Bike sports director. "Jonas has to be happy with the performance that he showed because it was not that he had a bad day."
With Vingegaard now as good as two minutes down on Pogacar overall however, things are starting to look bleak in terms of the Maillot Jaune. "It doesn't change a lot," Niermann insists however. "We have to gain time somewhere, or at least try to do that. We will try and we will until we finish the Tour in Nice. But yeah, for the moment it's two minutes behind. Pogacar was maybe better than we hoped. We don't expect anything, but of course we hope that Jonas can keep up with Tadej but that was impossible today," he concludes.
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