Jonas Vingegaard has declared himself fit to defend his Tour de France title, but is opting to downplay expectations following three months out injured.
The Visma-Lease a Bike rider crashed hard at April’s Itzulia Basque Country, breaking a collarbone and ribs as well as puncturing his lung. It was hit and miss whether or not he would make it to the Tour’s startline in Florence, but the Dane spent four weeks training at altitude in the French Alps and impressed selectors enough to guarantee his place.
UAE-Team Emirates’ Tadej Pogačar is the favourite to win the race’s yellow jersey, but Vingegaard has promised to give his arch-rival a run for his money, while at the same time insisting that just being at the race is “a victory in itself” and that “everything from here is just a bonus.”
“My ambitions are to go for the best possible result in the GC,” the 27-year-old said. “From here, if I get a result, I will be very happy.
“Of course, if I wouldn’t have progressed I wouldn’t be here [so] I am definitely here for victory. But of course things have changed in the last three months.
“I still have my hopes that I’m good enough to fight for the victory at least but I guess we will see in the coming three weeks. And as I said, everything is a bonus from now.”
Vingegaard’s team has consistently said that they wouldn’t select him for the race if they didn’t believe he was at 100% condition and didn’t have a chance of winning a third successive maillot jaune. The fact he will begin the race indicates that his form is good, despite not having raced since his crash, and his coach, TIm Heemskerk, has repeated that he has never seen an athlete recover as fast as Vingegaard.
In reflecting on his three months of recuperation, Vingegaard said that “every second day you think you make it, and every second day you think you don’t make it.”
He added: “It's probably been the hardest moment of my career over the last few months but I think in that situation you just think about fighting back rather than feeling sorry for yourself and that's what me and my family have done for the last three months, trying everything we could to get ready for this race.
“The most difficult thing has been physically getting back to the same level. I had to take a long break [off the bike of three weeks] after my crash, and I had a lot of injuries that needed to heal before I was able to train properly.
“I did a lot of good work and I’m not in a bad shape. I just hope that all the good work we have done together will pay off.”
Vingegaard will be without key domestique Sepp Kuss in the race, with the American not having recovered from a recent Covid infection. “Sepp is a very, very valuable rider, so we will miss him a lot,” Vingegaard rued.
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