16 hours ago
3
Thymen Arensman won a shortened 19th stage of the Tour de France, from Albertville to La Plagne, after attacking alone on the final climb. The race leader, Tadej Pogacar, untroubled by any meaningful attacks, maintained his overall lead from Jonas Vingegaard.
The victorious Ineos Grenadiers rider, whose team have been fielding questions over a staff member involved in an anti-doping investigation related to their glorious days as Team Sky, was taking his second victory in the race.
But it was a disappointing stage for Scotland’s Oscar Onley, who after surviving almost everything that the Tour could throw at him, fell away from the podium positions in the closing moments, after third-placed Florian Lipowitz attacked to move clear with Pogacar and second-placed Vingegaard.
With only 22sec between them, Onley and Lipowitz were inseparable for most of the stage, but, when Pogacar launched his first attack with seven kilometres to go, Lipowitz struggled to follow. However the German subsequently turned the tables on Onley, taking another 40sec on the young Scot at the line to further secure a probable third-place finish in his debut Tour.
Ahead of them, Arensman, winner in the Pyrenean stage to Superbagnères was hoping to replicate that success with another summit finish stage win, but as he entered the final two kilometres his lead began tumbling.
Yet the grimacing Dutch rider hung on to win by only two seconds as Vingegaard, who had said he would risk all to win the race, finally attacked Pogacar in the last kilometre to finish just ahead of him.
“I’m absolutely destroyed,” a drained Arensman said after the stage. “Already to win one stage in the Tour, unbelievable. But now, to win from the general classification group, against the strongest riders in the world, feels like I’m dreaming.”
Arensman said that his lack of interest in the overall standings had fed into his decision to attack. “I started the climb with the lead group and I was: ‘I have no GC [interest], maybe I should just try, maybe they will look at each other.’”
Of his series of accelerations, he said: “I didn’t take no for an answer … It was Tadej and Jonas. Everybody knows they are the strongest in the world, they are almost aliens. I just can’t believe I beat them today.”
The stage, originally scheduled to be 130km over four climbs was truncated in length by almost 40km, after a cull of infected cows led to the removal of two climbs, the Côte d’Héry-sur-Ugine and the Col des Saisies.
Lipowitz’s Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe team had clearly intended to test Onley’s resolve and when Primoz Roglic attacked on the descent of the Cormet de Roselend, the tactic isolated the 22-year-old Onley even further.
As cold rain fell on the valley road to La Plagne and UAE Team Emirates XRG gave chase, Roglic’s advantage ebbed away, until he was caught and summarily dispatched at the foot of the final climb.
after newsletter promotion
On the long climb, the quartet of Pogacar, Vingegaard, Onley and Lipowitz rode a steady pace, but no meaningful attacks came until the final kilometre, allowing Arensman to succeed in his lone mission.
“I was counting down the kilometres to the end,” Pogacar said. “If somebody attacked I could still accelerate, which is why I went at a certain pace. But congrats to Arensman. He was super good.”
However, Pogacar, who seems more world-weary by the day, admitted that he was “obviously tired”. “It’s not been an easy Tour, people attacking me from day one to the end, so it’s about staying focused.”
The convoy now begins the journey to Paris, the long way round, with a stage from Nantua, through the Jura, to Pontarlier, in the Doubs. Anything is, of course, still possible, particularly on Sunday’s final stage through Paris, which replicates the Paris 2024 road race and includes three laps of the Côte de la Butte Montmartre.
Asked if that stage might present another opportunity to win, the race leader sounded dismissive. “I hope I just come to Paris with the yellow jersey,” Pogacar said. “I don’t feel like super-energised right now to think about racing on Sunday. It’s a really hectic parcours and Sunday is Sunday.”
