Jonas Vingegaard wins the Tour de France for the first time in his career. And how! The Dane dethrones defending champion Tadej Pogacar and once again triggers a huge cycling magic in his home country. There he was too slight for football and is known because of his mother-in-law.
Jonas Vingegaard suddenly became very serious. The emaciated Tour de France winner in the yellow jersey had politely shared his feelings after the biggest win of his career, then the inevitable question of doping arose. Vingegaard replied emphatically - and in doing so made a promise to the thousands of fans in his native Denmark.
No, late revelations and scandals like his compatriot Bjarne Riis, the first Dane in yellow on the Champs-Elysee, assured the 25-year-old, are not to be feared. "We are all absolutely clean. I can say that for each of us. I'll tell you this directly and without hesitation," said Vingegaard in front of the assembled world press about himself and his team Jumbo-Visma.
The problem at home: Danish cycling is still suffering from Riis' actions. The country produced numerous strong drivers in the doping era of the 1990s. Rolf Sörensen, Jesper Skibby, Bo Hamburger - they all belonged to the top of the world. None of them came close to Riis. In 1996, as Telekom captain, he also won the Tour de France with the help of Jan Ullrich. He was doped to the brim, as he later publicly confessed. Because of his sometimes extremely high hematocrit value, he was nicknamed "Monsieur 60 percent". In 1997, Riis lost the tour to Ullrich. His career ended three years later.
The injury is still deep in Denmark. When hundreds of thousands celebrated the Grand Depart in Copenhagen at the beginning of July and moved their new hopeful Vingegaard to tears at the team presentation in the sun-drenched Tivoli, the only Danish overall winner to date was not allowed to celebrate.
While at this point Vingegaard's fame worldwide was manageable, he already had a big name in his homeland. However, that was not only due to his cycling prowess and surprising second place finish at the Tour of France 2021, but also to his mother-in-law, who rose to national fame after taking part in a TV back show and starring in Denmark's version of 'Dancing with the Stars" occurred.
The development was unforeseeable for Vingegaard, who comes from a fishing village with only 370 inhabitants. He played handball and football as a child, although he was too small for that, and was a keen Liverpool fan. He only turned to cycling after watching the Tour of Denmark near his parents' home.
As in the previous year, the youngster moved early to the front line at Jumbo-Visma on this tour after Primoz Roglic, the real challenger of defending champion Tadej Pogacar, was again unable to keep up. As a result, Vingegaard had benefited from an unusual slump by Pogacar in the Alps when arriving at the Col du Granon, taking 2:51 minutes from the Slovenian and thereby snatching the maillot jaune.
On the following stages, Vingegaard parried all the attacks of the former dominator and then made the preliminary decision in the last Pyrenees showdown. The freestyle followed on Saturday with second place in the individual time trial. "It's great to be part of this journey. I'm proud of the whole team," said Vingegaard.
He can't lean back. He knows that Pogacar, who has been considered almost unbeatable for the past two years, will not let this tour pass. "He's a great guy and one of the best drivers in the world. He'll definitely want more," said Vingegaard. But: "I also want more. Of course I'm still hungry."
