Mathieu Heijboer is surprised, „flabbergasted” even. Jumbo-Visma’s performance manager, responsible for everything related to time trial at the Dutch team, is standing under a tent at the finish of the sixteenth stage of the Tour de France watching the last meters of Jonas Vingegaard and can smile not suppress. “This is it,” he mutters repeatedly, mostly to himself.
During the time trial from Passy to Combloux, two mountain villages at the foot of Mont Blanc, Heijboer sees a plan he started working on seven months ago turn out exactly as planned. On the ‘false flat’ to the finish line, his Danish leader lies in a perfect aerodynamic position on his time trial bike. “There was a lot of discussion about whether we should exchange the time trial bike for a regular bike because you would climb faster with it,” says Heijboer. “But the way Jonas arrives at 30 kilometers per hour, you can’t compete with that with an ordinary bicycle.”
The game of seconds lasted two weeks between Vingegaard and his Slovenian competitor Tadej Pogacar, who were ten seconds apart on Tuesday morning at the top of the ranking for the yellow jersey. In six mountain stages where the other competitors were ridden on minutes, the two exchanged no more than a handful of seconds.
Until Tuesday afternoon. In the time trial – 22 kilometers long, with a nasty steep climb in it – Vingegaard takes 1 minute and 38 seconds on Pogacar, who is still second. Time trial specialist Wout van Aert drives at an appropriate distance to the third fastest time, 2 minutes 51 from the winner.
No one expected this, not even at Jumbo-Visma. Teammate Van Aert literally takes his cap off, Vingegaard himself says that during the ride he thought his power meter was broken, that’s how high the wattages were displayed. “This exceeds our wildest expectations, 1 minute 38 is a lot,” says sports director Arthur van Dongen. Heijboer had taken into account the loss of time, he says, hence his great surprise.
Read also: Vingegaard and Pogacar fight for every second
Tired continuously
But Pogacar’s loss of time is the result of the tactic that Jumbo-Visma has been using throughout the Tour: trying to tire the Slovenian as much as possible by making each stage as tough as possible. “You hope that that tactic will come to fruition one day, and today that happened,” says sports director Van Dongen.
In addition, the Dutch team has prepared this time trial down to the smallest detail. Heijboer already calculated in December that a bicycle change was pointless – Pogacar did it and therefore lost about ten seconds. “We know that Jonas feels super comfortable on that time trial bike and can deliver the same power uphill. Then there is only the matter of the weight of the bicycle, but that difference was not worth changing,” says Heijboer.
Together with the mechanics and bike manufacturer Cervelo, the performance manager has done everything possible to make the bike as light as possible. For example, the bicycles were completely black, without the yellow surfaces and other details that are normally visible. “We stripped the bike and painted it black. That saves about a hundred grams,” says Heijboer.
During the altitude training sessions of the team in the run-up to the Tour de France, a lot of attention was paid to training on the time trial bike. Specifically, riding uphill in an aerodynamic position was practiced. And already in March, after calculations by Heijboer, the team tells Vingegaard that he does not have to change bikes on Tuesday. “In this way we were able to create peace in his head very early on and remove any doubt,” says Heijboer. It works, the trainer notices on Tuesday morning. “Jonas was very calm and indicated that he felt good, that gave us a lot of confidence.”
Uplifting texts
When the Dane rolls off the starting podium in his yellow time trial suit on Tuesday, the last part of Jumbo-Visma’s plan unfolds. “Today you are going to show that you are the strongest in the world,” says sports director Grischa Niermann, who drives behind Vingegaard in the car, over the radio to his leader. Such invigorating texts work well with the Dane, says Heijboer afterwards. Vingegaard also receives tactical information about the course, so that he knows in which corners he can go flat out and where it is better to slow down a bit.
Already on the first climb, the Dane’s lead on Pogacar is ten seconds. He steadily expands that gap, until he has taken so much time on the finish line that he is now 1 minute and 48 seconds ahead in the standings. Heijboer: “Jonas was better than Pogacar today on all fronts.”
The Slovenian is not yet won. “Especially if it starts to rain tomorrow during the toughest stage of this Tour, it can still be very interesting,” says Pogacar after the finish. His team manager of UAE Emirates, Mauro Gianetti, can only be satisfied with the performance of his leader, he says. “Tadej was more than a minute faster than Wout van Aert. That is amazing. But Vingegaard was superior today.”
Also at Jumbo-Visma, no one wants to talk about the fact that the duel between Vingegaard and Pogacar has been fought. Certainly not now that the queen stage from Mont Blanc to Courchevel, with four tough cols and 5,399 altimeters, is on the program on Wednesday. “Nothing has been decided yet, but this is a step in the right direction,” says Van Dongen. “We look forward to the next stages with great confidence.”
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper on July 19, 2023.
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