Tour de France Week Three/Full Recap

So it goes every July… Sadly, Le Grand Boucle has run its course. All of the emotions we’ve collectively experienced for 21 days in July have to be processed and filed away so we can all move on. There are more races to be won (and written about) coming in quick succession.

Week Three got off to a brutal start with Stage 16, a hilly time trial in an Alpine Valley. To the disappointment of cycling fans everywhere, the battle for the General Classification of the Tour de France probably ended with this stage. As the riders went off one by one to privately suffer unspeakable physical agony for about 35 minutes, there was an ever-crescendoing din from the thousands of (mostly) drunk spectators lining the course. It should be noted that the fans have seemed to behave worse than ever this year, causing crashes by being too close to the race, constantly running alongside riders on climbs, heckling their opponents, bringing dogs to the race, and so on. Such behavior should be strictly cracked down upon by French authorities. If the biggest bike race in the world cannot be free of invasive fans, then the sport really needs to look itself in the mirror. But I digress; it was the riders, and the usual two suspects in particular on this stage, who deserve our attention. Yes, almost as soon as Tadej Pogacar had begun pedaling, he had a GPS-measured lead of around 20 seconds on the leader in the hot seat, Wout van Aert. Pogacar would continue to extend his lead and end up nearly catching his two-minute man, Carlos Rodriguez. It seemed that he had put in a sterling ride. But curiously, within minutes of the maillot jaune, Jonas Vingegaard, sprinting off of the start ramp, he himself had built a lead of a similar margin over the Slovenian. This seemed impossible, and some GCN commentators were in actual disbelief. I was not sure what to believe, but as Jonas went through the time checks, my worst fears were confirmed. He was leading Pogi by over a minute going into the final few kilometers. By the end of the TT he had almost caught the best rider in the world, his two-minute man. Vingegaard had ridden what by some metrics appeared to be the greatest time trial in history, defeating Pogacar by 1:38, who in turn defeated Wout van Aert by 1:13. The margin between 1st and 3rd as a percentage of overall time ridden was the highest in many decades, at a time in which the depth and overall level of the sport were in a far different place. The watts per kilogram estimates for Jonas’ final climb confirmed that he had done one of the most unbelievable rides of all time, on a TT or otherwise. There were two questions on the minds of the press and the fans: Is the Tour de France suddenly over? And “Is Jonas Vingegaard on drugs?” Most would have answered the first with: “Yes” immediately after that stage. Unfortunately, this was the correct answer. The other, while impossible to know, seemed to be, sadly, in the consensus of internet dwellers, to also be “Yes.”

Stage 17 was the Queen Stage, and in fact, it was one of the hardest Tour de France stages in the past few decades. There promised to be an insane battle to get into the breakaway and a probable ruthless chase from the superteams. Would Pogacar be able to punch back from a huge time loss the day before? I was not confident, as the stage suited Jonas more, and Pogacar had not looked his best the day before. As a break was getting away with GC threats involved, Pogacar managed to crash himself in the peloton and bloody his shin. Very little was said in the aftermath of the stage, by him, his team, or the press about this incident, so I do not believe that the crash was much of a factor in what was about to happen. As the peloton began to climb the Col de la Loze, the hardest climb in this year’s Tour, I had never seen Pogi look so tired and unwell. The breakaway, to their credit, was flying and managed to hold the peloton at bay despite some desperate chasing by INEOS Grenadiers to try to defend Rodriguez’s GC position, which was being threatened by Bilbao and Simon Yates. The strongest climber in the breakaway proved to be Felix Gall, and he would absolutely cook the Loze and win the stage over Simon. Meanwhile, 7 or 8 kilometers from the top of what would prove to be the cruelest mountain in France, Tadej Pogacar came off of the back of the peloton. Sepp Kuss immediately got on the front and drove the pace for Jonas. I thought Pogi would lose four minutes; he wound up losing six. It took seconds for you to read that, but for the rider and the fans, it was an agonizing eternity of emotional and physical suffering. The Tour was well and truly over. Writing this on Sunday, I’ve already dealt with the emotions of the Loze stage. And so has Pogacar himself! That being said, for as long as I live, I will never forget the UAE team radio clip captured on television as the camera zoomed in on a ghostly pale, haunted, and (not fully metaphorically) dying Pogi. The voice of the greatest bike rider on earth, on his way to ascertaining his GOAT resume, a generally jubilant 24-year-old, the thought-to-be untouchable Tadej Pogacar flickered over the radio. He tragically told his team “I’m gone. I’m dead.” To which his team director said “Adam, fight for the podium. Marc, always with Tadej.” Soler did his duty and stayed with the suffering Slovenian all the way to the finish line. Pogacar embraced his whole team for minutes after crossing the line in some of the saddest scenes of the year in cycling. The General Classification after this stage belied how closely fought this Tour de France had been for 2.5 weeks. The official scoreboard showed a rampaging Vingegaard more than 7.5 minutes ahead of second-placed Tadej Pogacar. Third place was for Adam Yates.

Stage 18: A sprint stage as the peloton began the transition from the Alps to the Vosges, this stage was quite strangely ridden. A truncated fight for the breakaway resulted in just three riders up the road: Kasper Asgreen, Victor Campanaerts, and Jonas Abrahmsen. Alpecin, the team of Jasper Philipsen, foolishly kept the gap way too tight at just 60 seconds as the peloton rode in a single-file line. The breakaway was clearly just rolling through without committing many watts to the effort. The problem with a narrow gap like that is that it opens the door to counterattacks, which began on a climb about 60 kilometers from the finish. Philipsen then engaged in one of the most unsportsmanlike tactics I’ve seen in this Tour, yelling at, remonstrating, and proceeding to nearly run off the road Pascal Eenkhoorn of Lotto-Dstny, who was attempting to bridge up to the break and his teammate. Karma would have its day, however. Eenkhoorn swerved around Philipsen and successfully made it into the break. Alpecin continued to screw up the stage and eventually, it became clear that it would be tough to catch the breakaway, despite a narrow gap and a small cadre of engines up the road. Into the final kilometer, the attackers maintained a lead of just eight seconds, and it was looking like it would come down to the wire. Campanaerts did a superb lead-out for Eenkhoorn, but Asgreen, the winner of the Ronde van Vlaanderen in 2021 (outsprinting MVDP) was way too strong and won the stage with the desperately chasing sprinters relegated to the minor places! This is the type of stage I enjoy as much as any other. The breakaway underdogs just tug at your heart working tirelessly for hours in the wind, as the big bad sprinters sit in their teammates’ wheels. And somehow, in the biggest race in the world, it happened. The break made it on a flat stage. As beautiful as this stage ended up being, the next one would prove to be even better.

Stage 19: The fifth-fastest stage in the history of the Tour was an epic slugfest from the gun. After many battles to establish a breakaway, eventually, a three-man group of Matej Mohoric, Ben O’Connor, and Kasper Asgreen would contest the final sprint. Asgreen was the strongest, but Mohoric came out of the wheel at the last moment to pip him by a tire width at the line. What I and almost every other viewer of this Tour will remember from this stage was the legendary interview Mohoric gave after his victory, in which he confessed to imposter syndrome (feeling like he didn’t belong in the Tour because the level is just unfathomably high and it is hard to even hold the wheel at times) and also admitted that he felt guilty that everybody in the race did not get the opportunity to win a stage. Most importantly, however, his tears were for the memory of Gino Mader, his former teammate, who passed away tragically after a crash at the Tour de Suisse in June. A lot of people wanted to see Bahrain-Victorious do well in this Tour because of Gino. But in the interview, there was more than can be summarized here. It was four minutes of touching words from a Slovenian top cyclist, speaking English to a French interviewer. I highly recommend giving it a listen.

Stage 20: On the final mountain stage of the Tour, the relevant rider in the breakaway was the one and only Thibaut Pinot, on home roads in the Vosges. He managed to drop all of his companions and hold the peloton at bay over the top of the penultimate climb, with thousands of his friends cheering for him with as much passion as I’ve ever seen in a bike race. However, both UAE and Jumbo had made their intent clear from early on in the stage that they would try to control the break. Pogacar had stated after his collapse on the Col de la Loze that he would try for this stage. I wasn’t sure he would have the legs for it. But UAE dutifully caught the flying Pinot on the final climb. After a complicated series of feints and attacks from the best climbers in the world (aside from those that rode the Giro) battling to hold or improve their GC positions, it was the two dynamos at it again. Pogacar could not shake Jonas, and a flying Felix Gall caught them and pulled the rest of the climb. Eventually, Adam and Simon caught up and the five of them would ride the rolling plateau to the finish line, with Pogacar the favorite to win the sprint, especially with a teammate to do the leadout and cover attacks. In the final uphill kick to the line, Pogi wrecked everybody else to claim his second stage of the 2023 Tour de France, secure second place and the young rider’s jersey, and prove his true champion’s mindset. As a side note, Pinot took the most combative rider award for the stage and hung on valiantly for seventh place and 11th on GC.

Stage 21: The ceremonial procession onto the Champs-Elysees in Paris is not quite what it is billed as. Sure, there is champagne and photographs and no real attacks until the Champs, but once the riders hit the cobbles it is a brutal crit. This year was the most epic war I’ve seen since I began watching the Tour. The attacks were relentless, the most stinging by Pogacar, who held off the peloton for numerous kilometers before realizing his attack, with van Hooydonck of Jumbo-Visma sitting on his wheel, was futile. The baroudeurs would roll the dice numerous times without a strong presence at the front of the peloton from the sprint teams. It seemed like this could be the year the sprint teams were foiled and a courageous attacker would make it. Alas, it was not to be, as Matthieu van der Poel did his characteristic ridiculous lead-out for Philipsen, who proceded to lose the sprint to the unheralded Jordi Meeus. It was nice to see the low-key German take by far the biggest win of his career.

But what I always remember more from the final stage of the Tour is the podium ceremony for the various winners of classifications. My favorite is the final GC podium. The best three riders from the Tour are honored for their herculean efforts. Their faces tell many stories: the gauntness, the haunted eyes, the smiles for the cameras that can only be genuine from the guy who achieved what he wanted in this race. In this case, that would be first and third place. Adam Yates has to be pleased with a podium, his best-ever finish in a Grand Tour. And of course, Jonas Vingegaard, the winner of two consecutive Tours, would be a very happy boy. But Pogacar is at a crossroads. He’s been defeated in two straight years in France. His ebullience must be ever-so-slightly forced.

So what to make of the 2023 Tour de France?

Well, for the viewer, it was one of the best Tours I can recall watching. I will randomly list some of my favorite aspects. The back-and-forth between the two main protagonists and then stalemate in the second week was enthralling. The strength of the breakaway riders was a sight to behold, many of them fighting desperately to move up in top-1o GC positions. The might of Jumbo-Visma has to be reckoned with.

But what I will take most from this 110th Tour de France is the emotions. I’ve always felt that cycling is the perfect metaphor for the human experience. You have cheating, sacrifice, teamwork, triumph, joy, defeat, heartbreak, and above all, suffering. If that does not encapsulate the whole range of a human life, I do not know what does.

For most of civilized human history, large swathes of young men were sacrificed as pawns in war so that a general could conquer new territory or usurp the throne, or numerous other idiotic motivations. We have now, for the most part, moved past that asinine system in the West. But human instincts are hard to change. Sitting in a dark room on one’s computer for eight or more hours per day and doing very little physical activity is unnatural and deeply unhealthy for the brain and body. It’s part of why so many men, especially young men, are “lost” according to many folks in the media who may or may not have our best interests in mind. However, I digress before this blog becomes political. The fundamental point here is that contemporary life in the Western world is not satisfying to many young men, and those that want an alternative often turn to sport. Cycling is the ultimate pursuit for this, because the parallels between a European bike race and a medieval battlefield are striking. You have generals, issuing commands from a safe distance (the team car), foot soldiers (domestiques), cavalry (the team leaders) noise (if you have never been involved in or witnessed a bike race, you would be struck by how loud it was) injuries, chaos, and the occasional death. Of course, cycling is safer than a medieval war, but the similarities are there. I believe whatever instinct led men into battle for so many years of human history is the same that gets them on their bike, racing around Europe in a tightly-packed and dangerous peloton, through wind, rain, cold, heat, over cobblestones, up and down mountains on narrow roads…

The Tour is not merely another bike race, it is THE race the average person knows about, while almost every other is relegated to the minds of the professional peloton and the diehard fans. So success here is worth far more, financially, and in glory, than in any other race. Failure here can spell the end of one’s career and a lifetime of regret. Because it is an insane three-week sporting event that greedily consumes the physical and emotional energy of its participants, the Tour, in the words of Johan Bruyneel, for all involved, and those crazy enough to follow along with such passion that a bike race influences their emotions, transcends sport and becomes life itself. It certainly did so for me at points during the past three weeks. And for that, I tip my cap and say thank you to everybody who makes the Tour de France happen each year, for Twenty-One Days in July. There is simply nothing on Earth like it.

I can cope better with the emotions of Pogi losing again than those of the Tour being over for another year. This cycling race is literally Christmas in July for me, and now, like a child, I have to wait another year to open 21 presents. It is actually heartbreaking.

That being said, the Vuelta commences in 33 days. There are big races in between and after the Spanish Grand Tour. There is a lot to look forward to this summer and fall. The cycling calendar, like life, does not stop for anyone, even in defeat. What matters is that we (the cycling community) will be okay.

I will be putting a lot more effort into this blog in the coming months as I attempt to make this lucrative. I love it with all of my heart, and I feel I’ve found a niche by focusing on the emotional side of the race. While I love analyzing tactics and watts per kilogram and average speed and so on, what truly makes the sport special is the story it tells. It has the potential to unite us as humans, make us laugh, smile, cry, scream (for better or worse), and leap with joy. And if you can do all of those in one day, well, as Jim Valvano said, that’s a hell of a day.

Vive le Tour.