There was a moment in stage eleven of the 2021 Tour de France, Wednesday of the second week, that the kilometer counter to Paris passed the halfway point, more than 1700 already consumed. It was on the way to the first of the two ascents of the Mont Ventoux, undoubtedly one of the toughest tests remaining for the race and Tour leader. UAE Team Emirates, Tadej Pogačar.
The Slovenian was tested by one of his great rivals, Jonas Vingegaardnear the top of the bare mountain and had to regulate his pace if he did not want to fall into crisis. The pace of the Dane showed him, as he would admit at the finish.
"In the Tour there are no easy days"..
Says a cyclist who is making history and marking epoch, because despite the instant of crisis, which he solved in the final descent to Malaucene, along with Richard Carapaz and Rigoberto Urán, Tadej Pogačar remains a solid leader of the Tour, with an income of more than five minutes over his pursuers, just when the race marks the halfway point.
Dominance on all fronts
Tadej Pogačar's Tour defense had, before the Ventoux, several key points that the Slovenian and the UAE Team Emirates have been able to solve.
The first week of the Tour 2021 is unanimously considered the most beautiful and contested in a long time..
The start in Brittany brought with it many important crashes, which were Tadej Pogačar was able to dodge, unlike the previous year, when he suffered a mishap that cost him a disadvantage at the finish line.. After the pile-ups that made our hearts pound, the first great day for Tadej Pogačar in the Tour 2021 was the time trial, an exercise that he executed flawlessly to achieve the victory, achieving something historic: Gobik climbed for the first time on the podium of the Tour de France.
Tadej Pogačar's time trial, therefore, would not work on its own, if the Slovenian and his team did not stay connected in the race. In that sense, the punishment of the memorable 250-kilometer stage finishing in Le Creusot was a test of maximum demand, for. an attack over 220 kilometers from the finish line, led by Van der Poel, in yellow, and Van Aert, made the team work hard. UAE Team Emirates to the limit.
The weak situation in which they left the team, so many attacks and from so many places, forced to take risks. Tadej Pogačar undertook an unforgettable ride in the first serious chain of the race, the Col de la Romme and La Colombière, with an attack 30 kilometers from the finish, in the rain and dangerous descents, which culminated in an income typical of the end of the Tour, only in the first week.
Tadej Pogačar did not win at Le Grand Bornand, but he did manage to the yellow jersey, the first in Gobik's Tour history.which he has kept intact past the halfway point of the race.
Now Tadej Pogačar has half a Tour ahead of him and a five-minute cushion over the first rivals.. The Pyrenees, next Sunday with the entry in Andorra and already in the third week, seem the most important filter, although, the Tour, and especially this Tour 2021, is proving that every stage counts, that danger lurks everywhere and in an indeterminate form, be it a fall, wind or bad timing.
Photos BettiniPhoto / Fizza Photo
