Bored, Jonas Vingegaard stands out of the saddle and stretches his body. Pogacar stares straight ahead. The road is vertical. McNulty Pedals. Demolition man on duty since the middle of the climb to Val Louron, 20km already, Pogacar’s American friend has reduced the peloton to rubble, tough cyclists, the best in the world, big names begging for mercy, Geraint Thomas, Nairo Quintana, Enric Mas… At his helm, the one in white, the one in yellow.
Dueling is a game of pride.
A used port, old cycling. Peyragudes, half of the old Peyresourde, the first Pyrenees pass the Tour scaled 112 years ago, and the peloton left Bagnères de Luchon at midnight, half the climb to a mountain airstrip, 1,580 meters high and a wall that was added 10 years and inaugurated by Valverde. Vingegaard, in yellow, and getting closer to Paris, is playing the game of confusion. He sneaks between Pogacar, the one in white, still so young, 23 years old, and the wheel that hypnotizes him. The Slovenian doesn’t flinch. Speak through the earpiece. 500 meters left. Wait your moment. The wall, the wall. The Koppenberg of Flanders, but with smooth asphalt and sun, in July, not April, and in the Pyrenees, where he wants to show the incoming Dane who is the best, as he did in Flanders with Van der Poel, the king of made the places. McNulty is consumed by accelerating even more. 16% incline. 300 meters. Pride launches Pogacar. A jetty. Vingegaard sticks, sticks, his wheel is a magnet. Wait your moment. Duel is a waiting game. There are still 175 meters to go when Vingegaard answers. The signal Pogacar has been waiting for rewards, dynamite going back to 100. He wins the stage as he won it, just like he did at the Planche des Belles Filles, so long ago that it seems like it happened at another Tour, and Pogacar was untouchable and looked like it. The duel.
They shake hands at the finish line. Nice boys. healthy young people. athletes. Pogacar stretches himself lengthwise on the tarmac, shivering on his helmet, his curls sticking out, fingering his shark fins, with San Pellegrino, acqua gassata, served by Joseba, his masseuse. Vingegaard steps onto the roller and degreases himself. He calls Trine, his girlfriend, who reminds him what she reminds him of every day, first of all, don’t read the newspapers, huh?, and he answers laconically without showing any emotion. The tour is a mental game
“Pride? My pride? No, no, not mine, that of the team,” says the Slovenian, who prefers to look for emotions, the force that mobilizes everyone. “I won for them. And tomorrow, the big day, go we more motivated than ever.” The hope. Hautacam. Vingegaard, at 2.18 minutes, four seconds closer, the bonus. “And I’m sure if Majka, Bennett, Soler had been in the Pyrenees today… we would have Vingegaard to retire brought,” adds the Slovenian in a show of unprecedented weakness and tears. “We were very unlucky, but we will continue to do it.”
On the podium, when they dress him in yellow over the Covid mask, the Dane’s little blue eyes shine happier than any day. “I didn’t win the stage, I was isolated, alone, without a team, but I was able to follow him,” he says. “So yeah, it’s been a tough day but perfect for me.”
Pogacar’s team, UAE, are four and one of them, Hirschi, is lame. In the morning they are scuttled in Saint Gaudens. Two left due to Covid; Marc Soler, also ill, got out of control the day before, a voluntary ordeal, a penance for not having resisted, and on the Péguère wall his fetish Majka, the poles that most encourages and amuses him, injured himself , because he pedals so hard that his bicycle chain breaks on the highest slope. There are four left and they respond by being a better team than ever, taking the stage and making it a torment for those who expect mercy. Danish time trialist Mikkel Bjerg, a heavy rider, accelerates on the Hourquette d’Ancizan, the second climb of the day, and the hitherto packed peloton falls to 20 soon after. 50 kilometers to go. A descent, and Val Louron, where McNulty, a mountaineer from Phoenix, Arizona, enters, where he begins the journey to Psycho and his motel, Janet Leigh, who does the rest. One by one everyone hangs up. three left.
In Aspin, cloudy and cool for a summer’s dreadful day, where climber’s paradise begins, the Tour is a game of champions of yesteryear, a shadow of what they were. Of Froome trying to escape, of Pinot, of Bardet, of whom they will never be again, but who refuse to accept it. They’re looking for tears like chickpeas on fans’ faces. Emotion. Nairo is also of his generation, but he looks younger than a year ago, than three years ago. With more vitality. Fighting for a podium, which would be a win this year when he’s 32, wouldn’t have the bitter aftertaste of the podiums he achieved in his Yellow Dream. 20th of July. Colombian day. More motivated than ever, the Tunja lion also gives up, one of those who form the platoon of those who make the Tour a game of resistance. And ahead, the soul of a time-trialist who calculates his heartbeat so he never overdoes it and dries up, Geraint Thomas, another Tour-winner, marches alone.
All find applause and oblivion. The tour, the best tour in many years, is the duel.
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