The presence of Tadej Pogačar places a glass ceiling of sorts on the rest of the Tour de France peloton. Not even past winners are immune. Geraint Thomas, fresh from victory at the Tour de Suisse, has ambitions beyond the podium place he currently occupies, but he knows, too, that Pogačar represents a unique obstacle.
“I think he’s just a level above,” Thomas told reporters on Monday’s rest day when he was asked to compare Pogačar with the other Tour winners he has encountered in his career.
“I think Nibali and Contador were great climbers, and Froome could climb and time trial really well. But Pogačar has got everything. He’s got the sprint, he can ride the cobbles, he can do everything, really. Phenomenal. I just can’t see how he won’t continue to be the biggest favourite for the next five or six years.”
The future is unwritten, of course, but in the here and now, Pogačar is the man most likely to carry the yellow jersey to Paris for the third successive year. As the race heads towards the high Alps, he leads Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) by 39 seconds, while Thomas lies third at 1:17, just ahead of his Ineos Grenadiers teammate Adam Yates.
The British squad left Copenhagen with a multi-pronged approach to the Pogačar conundrum, and while Daniel Martínez’s challenge floundered on Sunday, Thomas, Yates and debutant Tom Pidcock (7th at 1:46) have charted a steady course to this point. The problem, of course, is that Pogačar has been travelling at a rate of knots that nobody seems able to match for long.
A headline in Monday morning’s L’Équipe provocatively asked why nobody had deigned to attack Pogačar on the road to Châtel on Sunday. The answer, Yates explained simply, had a lot to do with the mildness of the terrain and the strength of Pogačar’s UAE Team Emirates guard.
“We asked the same question about everyone else, because it’s not just us,” Yates said. “At the moment, we didn’t feel the need to do anything. The climb wasn’t super steep, and UAE were setting a good pace. In a situation like that, it’s not wise to attack.”
Risk
Thomas echoed Yates’ point when he stressed that Ineos’ strength in numbers atop the general classification does not necessarily translate into superiority out on the road. And even if Ineos do manage to engineer problems along the way for Pogačar, the Slovenian would probably back himself to resolve them.
“It’s one thing having the numbers and another thing having the right situation to actually use them. And then you’ve got to have the legs to do it as well,” said Thomas, who admitted that Pidcock’s ability to last the course was an unknown. “The other teams might not see him as the biggest threat, but they also don’t know how far he can go, so he’s still a threat.”
Winner of this race in 2018 and fresh off the back of victory at the Tour de Suisse, Thomas is ambitious enough not to settle for a podium spot at this early juncture, but it remains to be seen how much he and his team are willing to risk in order to discommode the hitherto impregnable Pogačar.
“It depends on the risk, if it’s some crazy long-range thing, but to be honest, I’d be proud to make the podium again, especially after the last couple of years, to prove people wrong,” Thomas said. “But I have won it and been second before too. Just to make the podium would obviously be an achievement, but I’d definitely want to win the race as well. The main thing is to have no regrets in the Paris, and to have tried everything I could to win the race.”
The Tour’s second week features three consecutive days in the Alps, but while Tuesday’s short leg to Megève offers potential pitfalls, the following stages to the Col du Granon and Alpe-d’Huez are more likely to provoke separation.
“We do the Galibier before the Granon, and I generally feel pretty good at those kinds of altitudes. That will be interesting, the first real big test,” Thomas said. “Then Alpe d’Huez is just phenomenal and the heat will definitely add something to the race. And it will be the third straight day in the Alps, so that will be decisive as well.”
Four years ago, Thomas sank the foundations of his eventual Tour victory with back-to-back victories in the Alps, when he powered clear of the leading group atop La Rosière and then at Alpe d’Huez. The 21 hairpins are still where he left them in 2018, but the lie of the land at the Tour is very different. Then again, a lot can happen in three days in this exposed corner of the world.
“At the moment, we know Vingegaard and Pogačar are riding very strongly, maybe with some question marks over the UAE team,” Thomas said. “Having yellow brings everyone up, but I think the next three days will be a big test. It might reconfirm what we’re all thinking, or it might add a few doubts.”
