ISOLA: Tadej Pogacar climbed to a convincing victory on stage 19 of the Tour de France on Friday, extending his overall lead over defending champion Jonas Vingegaard to close on a historic Tour-Giro double.
With two tough stages remaining, the 2020 and 2021 Tour de France champion Pogacar leads Vingegaard by 5min 3sec. Remco Evenepoel remains third, now at 7min 1sec.
Pogacar is also two stages away from a Giro d’Italia and Tour de France double, which would be a first in 26 years.
A dominant and confident Pogacar had promised to attack here on the “Queen” stage with its massive mountains. He came into stage 19 with a 3min 11sec lead over Vingegaard, with Evenepoel at 5min 11sec in third.
“He set a terrible pace, he was just stronger,” said Belgian Evenepoel. “I was hoping Vingegaard might wilt, but he did well.”
The 2022 and 2023 champion Vingegaard’s sports director Grischa Niermann effectively accepted defeat.
“Jonas did an amazing job again today,” he said. “Its just that someone was stronger than him, and that’s been the story of this Tour.”
A happy Pogacar, who lives in nearby Monaco, celebrated at the line with his girlfriend.
“It helps that I live near here, I’ve trained here a lot and well, I also had good legs,” said Pogacar, who raced sparingly this spring.
“Coming second in the Tour gave me a lot of motivation to get better. This is no chance thing that I’m here.”
Heading into Friday Pogacar was careful to wait before celebrating, but was more relaxed ahead of Saturday.
“It’s a big gap. Tomorrow I can enjoy the ride on my home roads where I train and just watch out that nothing happens.”
