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Tour de France results, standings: Tadej Pogačar invincible with Stage 20 victory
By Carrie McDonald , USA TODAY,
5 hours ago
Slovenia’s Tadej Pogačar outsprinted rival Jonas Vingegaard in the final meters of the race to win the penultimate stage of the 2024 Tour de France on Saturday, effectively sealing his position as the general classification winner barring any catastrophe at tomorrow's individual time trial. Pogačar’s victory was his fifth individual stage win of the 2024 Tour de France and the 16th of his Tour career. With just one more test remaining tomorrow, the 25-year-old Slovenian seems invincible at this late stage of the race. Pogačar, of UAE Team Emirates, has had a dominant year. If he officially wins the yellow jersey on Sunday, he will become the first man in the 21st century to win both the Tour and the Giro d'Italia in the same season.
UAE Team Emirates team's Slovenian rider Tadej Pogacar celebrates as he crosses the finish line to win the 20th stage of the 111th edition of the Tour de France cycling race, 132,8 km between Nice and Col de la Couillole, southeastern France, on July 20, 2024. THOMAS SAMSON, AFP via Getty Images
"I’m really happy I got another stage win — just one more day to go," Pogačar said. "That one, I’m going to enjoy it too."
Stage 20 marked the last day of group racing, as Sunday's final stage will be an individual time trial for the first time since 1989. The riders will tackle a 21-mile route from Monaco to the Promenade des Anglais in Nice, France.
Along the mountainous route from Nice to Nice to Col de la Couillole, the best climbers attacked early. However, the ascending speed of Ecuador’s Richard Carapaz of EF Education-EasyPost and Spain's Enrich Mas of Movistar quickly separated the pair, who led the field until the final kilometers of the race.
With just the time trial remaining, Carapaz officially secured his polka-dotted jersey, becoming the first Ecuadorian to win the title in history.
"This Mountain jersey is a prestigious prize," Carapaz said yesterday after taking the lead in the mountains category. "All riders in my country dream of it because in Ecuador there are many mountains."
Eritrea's Biniam Girmay of Intermarché-Wanty also made history with his overall victory in the points classification, becoming the first Black rider to win a green jersey.
"We did such an incredible job to protect this jersey," Girmay said. "We gave everything we had."
Meanwhile, for most of the race, a second breakout group of the field’s top general classification riders formed to chase down Carapez and Mas. Approximately 8 km from the top of Col de la Couillole, white jersey wearer Remco Evenepoel of Belgium and Soudal-QuickStep attacked but failed to decisively break away as leading duo Pogačar and Vingegaard of Visma Lease a Bike followed.
Portugal’s Joao Almeida of UAE Team Emirates put in extra work to lead the top trio for a few kilometers in aid of team leader Pogačar until Evenepoel attempted to surge to the front once again. This time, though, Vingegaard responded fiercely, and only Pogačar could follow the Dane, dropping the Belgian in the top duo’s wake.
Vingegaard and Pogačar, both two-time Tour de France Champions, eventually caught Carapaz and Mas 2.5km from the finish line. Carapaz kept pace with the pair for a few hundred meters but was dropped in the last 800m of the race, setting the dynamic duo up for a sprint finish in which Pogačar ultimately prevailed. Pogačar’s relentless pace and strategic brilliance ultimately gave him a seven-second edge over his rival.
Pogačar now stands five minutes and 14 seconds ahead of Vingegaard and eight minutes and four seconds ahead of Evenepoel. Although Evenepoel has the best time trial ability on paper, Pogačar is so far ahead that, unless he suffers a disastrous outing tomorrow, the Slovenian should win his third Tour de France, having previously triumphed in 2020 and 2021, but finishing behind Vingegaard in 2022 and 2023.
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