Tour de France | Jonas Vingegaard arrives at the finish line exhausted and recalls, through tears, that he was on the verge of death: ‘It’s special’

Jonas Vingegaard He won a victory 98 days after his serious accident in the Return to the Basque Country, the same one that left him on the verge of death. The Dane made his greatest effort, recovered and with little preparation defeated Tadej Pogacar in stage 11 of the Tour de France.

Between fatigue and excitement, Vingegaard He could barely speak after the extreme effort he made to win his first stage in this Tour, a very special victory for him, after remembering that a few weeks ago he was in an intensive care unit fighting for his life.

Vingegaard breaks down

This victory means a lot to me. I couldn’t have done it without my family.

“I could never have imagined achieving this victory after everything I’ve been through these last three months. This victory means a lot to me. I couldn’t have done it without my family,” said the Dane after crossing the finish line in Le Lioran.

Vingegaard spent 33 days in hospital, one week in intensive care, after having fallen in the Tour of the Basque Country and suffering a pulmonary concussion, a situation that disrupted his preparation for the assault on the title in the ‘Grande boucle’.

At a press conference on Monday, during a day off, he spoke about what those agonising moments were like: “It was so bad that I thought I was going to die. And when I was lying there, I thought that if I survived this, I would give up cycling. But now I’m sitting here.”

Two days later, he was able to vent his anger and, in tears, confessed that it was incredible what he had done on the road. “It’s incredible that I have now won this stage, it means a lot to me. It’s a special victory,” he stressed, breaking into tears.

The two-time champion of Tour de France he dropped down from Pogacar on the ascent to Puy Mary and lost some time on the descent, but made up for it on the ascent to Pertus, the penultimate summit of the day. In the end, he won the one-on-one in a very exciting sprint.

“I preferred to go at my own pace, I didn’t think I would be able to catch him, but I did. I didn’t think I could beat him in the sprint either, so I’m very happy,” he said.

Death was near

“These past few months I’ve been through some difficult times. I thought I was going to die and seeing myself here is incredible,” he added.

The current champion of the French race said that he is surprised by his level of recovery, but denied that, as he claims, Pogacarwas downplaying his fitness level.

“You can’t be in the best moment of your career when you’ve only been training for a month and a half,” said the Dane, in response to the Slovenian’s comments, who said that he is “in the best moment of his life.”

Vingegaard believes that Wednesday’s stage could be “a turning point not only in the Tour, but also in a season in which the team has had very bad luck. I hope that from now on luck will smile on us. We have a plan and we are going to try to execute it in the best possible way.”

HAROLD YEPES

SPORTS

With EFE.