History repeated itself for Remco Evenepoel on Sunday as for the second time in 24 hours, the Belgian crossed the end line in a Tour de France Pyrenean stage in third place. Yet once more he had been distanced by prime two GC favourites Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard — however but once more, all the best way as much as the day’s summit end, Evenepoel had by no means seemed to be in bother. And with every upward pedal stroke, his podium place within the general rankings seemed more and more safe, too.
Previously three and a half minutes forward of fourth-placed João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates) after stage 15’s newest main mountain take a look at, Evenepoel has now elevated his benefit over the Portuguese racer by 5 minutes. And to spherical off an excellent day for Soudal-QuickStep, Remco’s key climbing lieutenant Mikel Landa completed fourth on the stage and has now moved into the highest 5 on GC.
“I attempted to observe for some time and if Jonas [Vingegaard] dropped his tempo, I might come again,” Evenepoel advised Sporza whereas he waited to obtain his newest white jersey of Best Young Rider classification chief, which he now leads by a substantial margin of over six minutes on Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos Rodriguez).
“But afterwards, I selected to go at my very own tempo and never threat going over the restrict. It was solely when Tadej attacked that the time gaps actually opened up,” he mentioned, with Evenepoel ending 2:51 down on Pogačar and 1:43 down on Vingegaard.
Evenepoel remained upbeat however cautious about his probabilities of staying on the provisional Tour de France podium, saying merely “It’s all about retaining your ft on the bottom and retaining working.”
“I believe I did effectively. Twice third within the Pyrenees – that is actually not a dangerous end result.”
“Right now Remco is simply dropping to 2 former Tour de France winners in what’s his first-ever Tour participation, so he is doing effectively,” Soudal-QuickStep director Tom Steels added.
“There’’s nonetheless every week to go, after all, however I believe if he can keep wholesome, we’re very near getting on the rostrum.”