Whether he is the fastest sprinter in the race, Fabio Jakobsen does not want to say on Saturday prior to the second Tour stage. “We will see that later,” he says minutes before the start in the Danish town of Roskilde. The 25-year-old sprinter of QuickStep Alpha Vinyl looks relaxed, as the handful of television crews and other press in the mixed zone calmly go before the start. He uses the racing bike that will soon help him to victory as a chair. His buttocks rest on the bar. He talks calmly.
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He is also a bit nervous, but he always has that before a ride, says 25-year-old Jakobsen to the NOS. He will make his debut this year in the Tour de France. In several interviews prior to the stage race, he says how much he wants to win a stage. “I once started racing to win, not to ride.” After five stage wins in the Vuelta a Espana, twice the Scheldeprijs and the Dutch road championship in 2019, a victory in Tour de France should be the next highlight of his career.
He is one of the sprint favorites in the Tour, perhaps the most important. Especially when it comes to a sprint of 250 meters. It will be in Nyborg, where the peloton will finish after 199 kilometers on Saturday afternoon.
Jakobsen’s train, which should bring him into the ideal position, is easy to recognize. Including the Belgian Yves Lampaert in his yellow jersey. He kept it from his win in the time trial the day before. But now he races again for the sprinter of his team – cycling remains a team sport.
fall
For a moment, Quick Step’s plan seems to go awry. on the wide Storebæltsbroen, the Great Belt Bridge, his yellow jersey wearer Lampaert and the Dane Michael Morkov were involved in a crash. Morkov is the last weapon in Jakobsen’s lead-out. An acclaimed rip-off, who helped Mark Cavendish, Sam Bennett and Ella Viviani to many stage wins in the past. Indispensable in the final actually. The two reunite.
When a hard crash follows 2.5 kilometers from the finish, Jakobsen is at the very front of the pack with his entire train. First, Kasper Asgreen sets the pace, then Lampaert. Trek-Segafredo comes alongside with two men, Wout van Aert also drives past him. If Morkov lets Jakobsen go, the last brake goes off with the Dutchman. He has to pass the Dane Mads Pedersen on the right, there is the hole. Only in the last meters does he put his wheel in front of Van Aert’s. His hands are off the wheel, he’s got it.
Good shape
The fact that 25-year-old Jakobsen was already one of the sprint favorites in advance was propelled by his form this cycling year. In every stage race where he was on the start list, he won at least one stage. And in three multi-day races (Algarve, Valencia and Hungary) he also took the points jersey.
Those victories did not determine whether Jakobsen would ride the Tour, he already knew that at the end of last season. The signing of British sprinter Mark Cavendish, late in the year, does not change that either. The experienced Cavendish, who last year equaled the record of 34 stage victories in the Tour of Eddy Merckx, is allowed to go to the Tour of Italy.
The fact that Jakobsen also beats fellow countryman Dylan Groenewegen (Bike Exchange) in the win in Nyborg – he finished eighth – gives the win something extra. “I prefer to beat him,” said Jakobsen before the stage. Every direct duel, every race where both are at the start, there is again attention for the duel. The consequence of Jakobsen’s dramatic crash in the Tour of Poland in August 2020, caused by Groenewegen. A crash that nearly cost him his life.
Jakobsen is not only reminded of the accident around a new tête-à-tête with Groenewegen. The speaker of service also mentions it in his announcement during the team presentation on Wednesday in Copenhagen. “I’m so glad you’re here, after you’ve been almost gone.”
It gives a stage win like Saturday, and certainly his first in the Tour undeniably more value. He has improved step by step since the crash in Katowice, says Jakobsen on Saturday after the stage on French television. Now, almost two years later, he has reached his top level. And he is the fastest sprinter of the peloton in the Tour de France.