Tour de France: Pogacar dreams of a double against a just resurgent Vingegaard

Pogacar-Vingegaard: the time for revenge has come. MAXPPP – CHRISTOPHE PETIT TESSON

The 111th edition starts on Saturday from Florence (Italy). The Slovenian, the big favorite, dreams of a Giro-Grande Boucle double. A first since 1998.

Despite a recent Covid, Tadej Pogacar advances as the big favorite of the Tour de France to take back his crown from a Jonas Vingegaard in mysterious form and achieve a Giro-Tour double unprecedented in the 21st century.

The 111th edition kicks off on Saturday from Florence and it was difficult to find a more enchanting setting than the cradle of the Renaissance, the city of the Medici, Boticelli, Machiavelli and Donatello, where palaces and museums compete in beauty, to celebrate the first departure from Italy in the more than century-old history of the event.

The casting is up to the moment since we will see the six cycling superstars for the first time at the start of a bike race – Pogacar, Vingegaard, Primoz Roglic, Remco Evenepoel, Mathieu van der Poel and Wout Van Aert. Since the unveiling in October of the course, which will end on July 21 in Nice, again a great first because of the Olympics, we are salivating at the prospect of seeing the first four, "the fantastic four", battle for the yellow jersey. Each with a story to tell.

For Evenepoel, it’is that of "the’exploration" as the Belgian prodigy says who waited until he was 24 to discover the Tour. For Roglic, it’s the opportunity for sweet revenge, four years after being dispossessed of the yellow jersey by Pogacar on the penultimate day.

"If there's one who can do it, it’s Pogacar"

For Vingegaard, it is the stake of a third consecutive coronation, like Louison Bobet, Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Miguel Indurain and Chris Froome. But one challenge surpasses all the others and it is up to Pogacar to take it up: winning the Tour of Italy and the Tour de France in the same year, a feat only achieved by seven riders in history, the last time by Marco Pantani in 1998.

Also read: Tour de France: Pogacar reveals he had Covid ten days ago but says he is "fully recovered"

Since then, it has been considered an almost impossible task and the last one to really try it was Chris Froome, winner of the Giro in 2018, then third in the Tour, at exhausted. Today, the Briton is convinced: “If there’s one who can do it, it’s Pogacar. I ended up on my knees. Even though he flew over the Giro, Tadej was able to save a lot more. He has a very good chance." At the end of the Giro, the 25-year-old Slovenian, who can rely on a UAE team that looks like a Dream Team (Yates, Ayuso , Almeida…), announced the color himself by claiming to have "never felt so good on a bike".

Vingegaard in the blur

"If he remains safe and sound, he will be unbeatable", Evenepoel deduced on Thursday, some minutes before Pogacar noted that he had contracted Covid ten days ago, a threat which is returning to hover over the Tour. Enough to instill a slight doubt ? "I am fully recovered", assured & quot;Pogi". Until proven otherwise, uncertainty first surrounds the state of form of his three main rivals, all swept away in the same collective fall at the beginning of April at the Tour of the Basque Country.

Roglic, the least affected, seems the most ready and has just won the Dauphiné. Evenepoel, victim of fractures to his shoulder blade and collarbone, formulates unusually cautious objectives: "A stage victory and the best possible general classification& quot;. As for Vingegaard, he himself does not know what to expect after twelve days of hospitalization in April for fractures and a pneumothorax, and almost three months without running, &amp ;quot;the most difficult of my career".

"He's going to jump at her throat"

Since the Dane's getting started could be laborious, many observers expect Pogacar to go on the attack on Saturday, between Florence and Rimini during the first stage with the steepest difference in altitude (3&nbsp ;700 m) of the history of the Tour. "He will jump at Vingegaard's throat to not let him breathe and settle down quietly. I think that by Tuesday evening, we will have Pogacar with the yellow jersey", predicts Julien Jurdie, the sports director of Décathlon-AG2R, to the AFP.

Overall, the first week, "completely crazy" according to Roglic, could cause significant gaps since there will also be the Galibier on the program from the fourth day, for the return to France, a time trial in the vineyards of Burgundy and the dreaded Chemins Blancs stage in Troyes on Sunday July 7, the day of the second round of the legislative elections in France. The Grande Boucle will then pass through the Cantal mountains, where Romain Bardet, for his last Tour, will want to aim for victory. Then the Pyrenees with the venerable Tourmalet. Before a finale in the Southern Alps, where we will climb very high (Cime de la Bonnette at 2 802 m) and a final time trial in Nice on Sunday July 21, thirty-five years after the legendary Fignon-Lemond duel on the Champs-Elysées.