Tour de France stage 4: Pogačar wins, Vingegaard impresses.
The Dane looks stronger, more confident and aggressive in these openings stages.
Tadej Pogačar, the anointed “greatest pro cyclist of all time” won today’s stage to Rouen. He did it in his typical swashbuckling style — hard acceleration that dropped everyone including the man in yellow, Mathieu van der Poel, and his chief rival Jonas Vingegaard.
The crucial distinction however is that he marginally, hardly, just a tiny bit, dropped Vingegaard. In the past, the Dane could not match these searing bursts of speed. Pogačar would always open a significant gap with that felt both shockingly effortless and inevitable. The bonus seconds were his along with whatever time he gained.
The one conclusion we can gather so far in this Tour is this: not so much anymore. The new improved Vingegaard has added muscle to his spindly frame — an intentional shift in his preparation designed to give him a more explosive burst. Not quite the Pogačar launch pad but not that far off, either.
Vingegaard announced at the start of this year’s Tour de France that he was in the best shape of his career, putting out more wattage than ever, and feeling an extra measure of confidence. The odds-makers have Pogačar as the clear favorite but Visma Lease-A-Bike has the strong belief that Vingegaard has a real shot at victory.
Over the first four stages the evidence has been visible and consistent. Unlike years past, Visma has been aggressive from the opening stage, forcing the pace, driving the front and making the race as hard as possible. They are not playing nice, they are not bidding their time, they are not waiting to play the one card in their hand. That shit is done.
Visma has a defined new strategy to make the race as grueling and exhausting from day one. They’re not sitting back and waiting for the high mountains in the Alps and Pyrenees to attack. They are all-in and full gas.
While every cycling journalist has pointed to Pogačar’s dominance over Vingegaard in the recent Dauphiné, few people mentioned that the Dane wins on attrition in the long, brutal climbs of Le Tour. Yes, the Slovenian has learned to optimize his nutrition, dial back his impetuous attacks and upgrade his time trial but his weakness is still a relentless climb in the final week of Le Tour that goes on forever.
So Visma has decided to make sure that Pogačar will be more exhausted after these opening ten days. They want to set the stage by wearing him out early, drawing down his reserves and hammering his domestiques every single stage.
The Tour is off to a rip-roaring start in large measure because Visma has fundamentally changed their methodology. What makes that possible is that Vingegaard is now physically capable of not only sticking to Pogačar’s wheel, but jumping in front of it.
New muscle, renewed confidence and a highly motivated squad — all that bodes will for a gripping battle once these two evenly matched rivals are on hors category territory.