Tour de France chief Tadej Pogačar has disregarded a question into using carbon monoxide rebreathers, a tool reportedly employed by some WorldTour groups as a measurement device for altitude coaching.
On Friday, Escape Collective reported that UAE Team Emirates, Visma-Lease a Bike and Israel-Premier Tech have been utilizing carbon monoxide rebreathers however didn’t specify which riders are utilizing them.
The article identified that these gadgets are usually not banned by WADA. The groups themselves confirmed that they’ve entry to carbon monoxide rebreathers, however they acknowledged that they use the method solely for measurement functions to optimise the advantages of altitude coaching.
On Monday, Jonas Vingegaard confirmed carbon monoxide rebreathers use in his crew in an interview with the Danish newspaper Politiken, saying, “There is nothing suspicious about it.”
Pogačar himself disregarded the query when requested if he had heard of the rebreathers and if he had used them in a post-stage press convention on stage 16.
“When I heard this, I used to be excited about the automotive exhaust, I don’t know. I don’t learn about that a lot, so I’ve no remark [behind]. I don’t know what it’s. I used to be all the time excited about what goes out from the exhaust of a automotive,” Pogačar instructed reporters, including laconically: “Maybe I’m simply uneducated.”
Back out on the street, Pogačar had a comparatively tranquil stage 16, the final flat day of the 2024 Tour de France, which proved, regardless of fears of crosswinds, to be comparatively uneventful till the closing kilometres.
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Although he was caught behind in a late crash when Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty), he got here by way of unscathed and in thirty seventh place, even jokingly ‘sprinting’ for the road in Nimes with a teammate as he completed.
While Pogačar might be in his aspect in Wednesday’s return to the excessive mountains at Superdevoluy and once more within the Alps on Friday and Saturday, he was requested if he had a message for the sprinters, whose probabilities of Tour de France success successfully ended at Nimes.
“They might want to survive, particularly the final [stage 21] time trial,” Pogačar instructed reporters. “I hope organisers make a pleasant time restrict within the final TT so sprinters that go all the best way to Nice don’t have to go full gasoline on this one.
“It´s a little bit of a disgrace, there is no such thing as a dash on the final day for them, in the present day was kind of the final and it´s a disgrace that they may miss the Champs Elysées. But I hope they gained´t abandon after in the present day.”
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