In particular, the Danish champion's choice to wear his modified, and slightly messy-looking bib tight straps externally, over the outside of his race jersey, garnered a lot of attention.
Vingegaard appeared to be wearing an extra pair of bibtights over the top of his shorts and leg warmers, which had been cut at the rear, and also appeared to have had the chamois pad removed; this could be spotted thanks to an additional cut lower down on the tights.
Vingegaard removed a few outer layers inside the last 40 kilometres of the race, including a backwards-fitted jacket, but it seemed he didn't have the chance to remove his bibtights.
After the race, he told media, "It was just full gas racing, there was not even time to take clothes off. So maybe you can call me a trendsetter with the long pants, but there was just no time to take them off."
Today, a post on the Visma Lease a Bike Instagram page has appeared, with Vingegaard himself explaining the strategy behind his unusual bib tights.
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Unsurprisingly, Vingegaard wore the extra bibtights to keep warm, and explained his plan was to rip the pre-prepared extra bibtights off as the race progressed.
"To keep me warm in the beginning, I wore the extra-long pants. We prepared the bibs so that two teammates could easily rip them off.
"After that, I could just take the parts on my legs off like leg warmers. In the end, the race was so hard that there were never two teammates around to tear the bibs off," he explained.
There we have it, Vingegaard pre-cut the extra bib tights at the rear to ensure team mates could more easily rip them, and remove them deeper into the race. The brutal nature of the stage, however, meant they stayed on until the end.
Vingegaard pre-ripped his bibtights with the view of team mates helping him remove them later on. (Image credit: DAVID PINTENS / Contributor)
Comments sections reacted with mirth after seeing the Dane's kit choice, but it was the two-time Tour de France winner who had the last laugh as he crossed the finish line alone to win the stage. The huge time gaps on Stage 4 of the Race to the Sun highlighted just how hard it had been.
Vingegaard's multiple layers to stay warm did what they needed to on a horrible day. Anyone who has frozen in a bike race or been going so hard they could barely reach into a pocket for a gel will know how hard it is to do the basics sometimes when the race is on.
And for a man who will have fresh memories of his recent training crash, anything that helps him maintain extra control over his bike will be an important upgrade, no matter how rudimentarily put together
Over the years, cycling champions have often appeared to wear more clothing than the rest of the peloton during races. Seeming comfortable enough not to need to remove outer layers, Tom Boonen keeping his leg warmers on in the early season spring classics when the rest of the bunch were in shorts and jersey springs to mind.
Tom joined the Cyclingnews team in late 2022 as a tech writer. Despite having a degree in English Literature he has spent his entire working life in the cycling industry in one form or another. He has over 10 years of experience as a qualified mechanic, with the last five years before joining Cyclingnews being spent running an independent workshop. This means he is just as happy tinkering away in the garage as he is out on the road bike, and he isn’t afraid to pull a bike apart or get hands-on with it when testing to really see what it’s made of.
He has ridden and raced bikes from an early age up to a national level on the road and track, and has ridden and competed in most disciplines. He has a keen eye for pro-team tech and enjoys spotting new or interesting components in the wild. During his time at Cyclingnews, Tom has already interviewed some of the sport's biggest names including Mathieu van der Poel, Tadej Pogačar and Alberto Contador. He's also covered various launches from brands such as Pinarello, Ridley, Specialized and more, tackled the Roubaix Challenge sportive aboard his own rim-brake Cannondale SuperSix Evo, tested over 20 aero helmets in the wind tunnel, and has created helpful in-depth buying advice relating to countless categories from torque wrenches to winter clothing.
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