The Belgian clinched victory in the mass sprint on Sunday in temperatures of up to 40 degrees after 202.5 kilometers from Rodez to Carcassonne ahead of Wout van Aert and Mads Pedersen. In the overall standings, Jonas Vingegaard is 2:22 ahead of defending champion Tadej Pogacar. For the Dane, however, things were anything but smooth: Because two of his most important helpers in the Jumbo Visma team had to retire.
The Slovene Primoz Roglic, who was originally considered a co-favourite, did not compete again because of his fall injuries from the first week, his unfortunate one tripseries continued. In 2020 he had to hand over the yellow jersey to Tadej Pogacar on the penultimate day and finished second behind his compatriot. Last year he also had to drop out due to fall injuries. The former Dutchman can no longer help either trip-Third Steven Kruijswijk, who had to retire. Vingegaard himself was also involved in a crash on Sunday, but was able to catch up with the field.
The big topic of conversation at the weekend, however, was the heat wave, which also has a firm grip on the south-west of France. On Sunday the thermometer even climbed to 40 degrees. the triporganization then put three special regulations into effect. The drivers were allowed to eat and drink from the start to ten kilometers before the finish. Empty bottles could also be thrown away outside the garbage zones. In addition, the grace period was set to 20 percent of the stage winner’s time, regardless of their average speed.
Even the fire brigade was in action. Since the asphalt was supposed to heat up to over 60 degrees, the road was partly cooled with water just before the peloton. The teams had up to 300 drinking bottles in the cars, a good third of which is normal. Pogacar even put ice cubes in his socks at the start. During the stage, the pros were given nylon stockings filled with ice cubes for their necks.
On Monday lays the trip the last day of rest before heading to the Pyrenees on Tuesday. On Tuesday there are 178.5 kilometers from Carcassonne to Foix.
Source: Nachrichten
