{"id":193419,"date":"2023-07-17T11:55:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-17T11:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?p=193419"},"modified":"2023-07-17T11:55:00","modified_gmt":"2023-07-17T11:55:00","slug":"tour-de-france-week-2-offered-more-drama-than-a-soap-opera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2023\/07\/17\/tour-de-france-week-2-offered-more-drama-than-a-soap-opera\/","title":{"rendered":"Tour de France Week 2 Offered More Drama Than a Soap Opera"},"content":{"rendered":"

This year\u2019s Tour de France is like a wealthy and generous uncle, it keeps giving and giving and giving. Just when you think that the race cannot get more dramatic, it does. And despite all of the drama of the past week \u2013 and there was more drama packed into those six days of racing than there is in a month of soap operas \u2013 nothing has been decided in the race for the yellow jersey.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The gap between the two protagonists, last year\u2019s winner Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) and Tadej Poga\u010dar (UAE Team Emirates), winner in 2020 and 2021, is a measly 10 seconds, the time it takes you to take a tissue out of your pocket and blow your nose. The smallest margin of victory in the history of the Tour is 8 seconds, Greg LeMond over Laurent Fignon<\/a> in 1989.<\/p>\n

But the numbers are only part of what makes this yellow jersey duel so exciting. It has been a chess match from the very start when Poga\u010dar\u2019s teammate Adam Yates grabbed the yellow jersey and Poga\u010dar took 4 seconds from Vingegaard on the climb to the finish. Since then, the 24-year-old Slovenian has turned the race into a battle for bonus seconds, and Vingegaard has accepted the challenge. When Jumbo-Visma sent the indefatigable Wout van Aert into yet another mountain stage breakaway, and then allowed that breakaway a gap of almost 9 minutes, the reason surely was to ensure that no bonus seconds would be available at the finish line because Vingegaard cannot match Poga\u010dar\u2019s explosive speed on steep climbs.<\/p>\n

But then he did match him \u2013 and even passed him on the way to the line, before easing up and casting a bemused, and challenging, smile at his rival. Game on, brother!<\/p>\n

Vingegaard has held a lead over Poga\u010dar since stage 5 when the latter faltered on the climb to the finish. Since then, Poga\u010dar has been chipping away at that lead and took it down to 9 seconds on stage 13 when he again outsprinted his rival on the climb to the finish. But the UAE Team Emirates leader suffered a lapse of concentration near the finish of the ascent of the Col de Joux Plane (11.7 km @8.5%), after apparently being hampered by a race motorcycle<\/a> and the massive crowds, and allowed Vingegaard to get the jump and outsprint him to the summit, to grab the remaining bonus seconds available. At the end of that stage, the big news was that Vingegaard had taken back 1 second (one!) in the GC race.<\/p>\n

\n
\n

\ud83d\udc9b 10\u2019\u2019 \ud83d\udcc8
\ud83e\udd47 Jonas Vingegaard \ud83c\udde9\ud83c\uddf0#TDF2023<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/7RoFyXQV0Z<\/a><\/p>\n

— Tour de France\u2122 (@LeTour) July 17, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n