Jonas Vingegaard became the first Dane to win the Tour de France twice. The 26-year-old reached the goal of the final stage on Sunday in Paris with the peloton. After around 3400 kilometers and 21 stages, Vingegaard was several minutes ahead of Tadej Pogacar from Slovenia. In the previous year, Vingegaard celebrated his first tour victory. The last stage was won by Belgian Jordi Meeus from the German team Bora-hansgrohe.
“Of course I’m very happy to have won the Tour de France for the second time. It was my big goal this year,” said Vingegaard. He drove out the decisive lead in the individual time trial on Tuesday and one day later on the queen’s stage to Courchevel. Until then, it was a duel with Pogacar for seconds.
“This year it was an incredible fight between me and Tadej. It was really tough to crack,” said Vingegaard. Above all, his rival saw Vingegaard’s Tour victory as his own weakness on the Courchevel stage, when he lost almost six minutes. “I cracked myself. Nobody else. That was me,” said Pogacar about his “worst performance of all”. In addition, the Slovenian was impaired by a fractured scaphoid in the spring and was unable to prepare properly for the tour.
Vingegaard received a call from Danish Crown Prince Frederik on Saturday evening after the penultimate stage. The professional cyclist will be received in Copenhagen on Wednesday. The convertible is to go from Kastrup Airport to the Danish capital’s town hall. There Vingegaard will appear on the balcony. As in the previous year, tens of thousands are expected on the town hall square.
A day later we continue to Vingegaard’s hometown of Glyngøre on the Danish mainland. 20,000 people received him there last year. Preparations for this year’s festival have been going on for months.
