Vingegaard had expected Pogacar attack on Alpe d’Huez: ‘Didn’t have my best legs’ | cycling

“I expected his attacks and was fortunately able to follow him,” Vingegaard looked back on the twelfth stage.

The heat made it extra hard to recover. “I think it was 35 degrees in the valley. I didn’t have my best legs after yesterday either, but I didn’t feel too bad either. Everyone will have suffered from the heat. I didn’t even think about trying to buy time today. It was all about keeping the margin with Pogacar,” said Vingegaard, who reached the finish line more than 3 minutes after the British stage winner Tom Pidcock, accompanied by the Slovenian and the Briton Geraint Thomas. In the standings, Pogacar is second at 2.22, four seconds behind Thomas.

Although the images were terrifying at times, Vingegaard had enjoyed the many fans on the flanks of Alpe d’Huez. “It was unbelievable and honestly I thought they behaved better than I expected. I know the images from other years too, but they encouraged us in the right way.”

Huge evolution

He was also more than satisfied with the work of his teammates, by whom he was surrounded until shortly before the finish. “We are one day closer to Paris”, concluded Wout van Aert, the Belgian in green who performed so much routine at the head of the group of classification riders. “It was super tough, but I think we recovered well as a team to defend the jersey,” he told TV channel sporza†

Van Aert suspected that Vingegaard had perhaps suffered the least. “It is super light, which is of course an advantage uphill. There will be battles to come, I am sure. Jonas has certainly gone through a huge evolution. We joined the team the same year. You can no longer compare him with the rider he was then. He has much more confidence and dares to speak out when he is good.”