Emerging from nowhere, like mythological creatures emerging from a cloud of dust, Tadej Pogacar rises to the top.
First.
Again
.
The Slovenian boy masters all the elements.
He directs them at his whim.
A capricious child at the counter of a candy kiosk.
All pleasures are allowed.
Rain, heat, wind, air, dust.
Earth, asphalt, pavement.
It is better than the qualified time trialists in the time trial, better than the
pedrícolas
on the boulders, better than the lords of the slopes on the short slopes, better than the climbers, better than Jonas Vingegaard, the only one who challenges him, and forces him to his limit, on the first pass, on the very spectacular Superplanche des Belles Filles, its garden, the hell of others.
The desolation of nothingness in the land of sour cherry trees and kirsch.
The Tour is a state of mind.
Pogacar, 23 years old, is the permanent stupefaction.
Seventh stage.
One third.
Two weeks remain for the rivals to prevent the thin line of hope called Vingegaard from disappearing swallowed by the Alps, by the Pyrenees, by the last time trial.
The entire Tour remains and despite all the blows that the Slovenian has dealt, who wins practically everything he runs, the Dane is only 35s away in the general classification.
The
soft power
of Pogacar, some would say, and the soundtrack of
killing me softly
by Roberta Flack, if the concept were not a contradiction in itself.
Her smile.
"But no," says Pogacar, looking down at the sleeves of her bright yellow jersey, a color tailored to her pale eyes, unruly blonde hair, and flushed cheeks.
“OK, I've won two stages and I'm in the lead, but the Tour is not over.
I have very strong rivals who are very close, all the big mountains remain.
The Tour is open, but I have a lot of confidence in myself.
I will do my best to defend the jersey.”
IT'S A MARTIAN!!!!
👽
When it seemed that Kämna was winning...
When it seemed that Vingegaard was winning...+
🔥 POCAGAR APPEARED AGAIN 🔥
Another victory for history in Le Planche #TDF2022 pic.twitter.com/EjNJb2wEjb
– Eurosport.es (@Eurosport_ES) July 8, 2022
It's Merckx and it's not scary, it's Armstrong and it's not terrifying.
Depress.
He transforms hope into frustration, rebellion into submission, in any case.
Smile and challenge.
Why can't you?
Nothingness is the end of the first step of La Planche.
A black asphalt line.
A grove of trees in the background, a change in elevation at 22% from which emerges, first the head, the helmet, then the rest of the body, and the bicycle, Lennard Kämna.
He is on the run from the start.
A year ago he decided that he did not want to be the German hope to succeed Jan Ullrich.
Much suffering, he said.
It's not life.
He took a few months off from life.
He returned to impose on his team, Bora, that he would never contest the general of a race, that he would only seek to win stages.
He fulfilled in the Giro, in Juanpe Rosa's Etna.
On the Tour he chooses a bad day to deliver.
Barely 30s later, out of the same nowhere, Rafal Majka, the Pole who plays with Pogacar, appears and they laugh together.
At the wheel of him, the Slovenian boy.
Behind, calculating and the heart to 200, all the favorites.
Majka is the seventh rider from the UAE to make a lead relay in a stage that the Pogacar team wanted to control at all costs.
Hirschi, Laengen, Bjerg, Soler, the king of the flat, have worked before, kilometers and kilometers keeping the break to three minutes --and in the break were strong runners, Teuns, winner three years ago in the Superplanche, Ciccone and his Pedersen, another Bora with Kämna, another German, Geschke, a Navarrese, Erviti, and they don't take a breather--, and then, already going up, the specialists, McNulty, Bennett, and, finally, Majka.
"I had been thinking about winning this stage for months, planning everything," says Pogacar,
who two years ago won the Tour over his compatriot Roglic on these same slopes in a time trial in which his myth was born, arising from nothing on the Planche.
“My father was at the foot of the port, my girlfriend, Urska, a kilometer away… It is a very important port for me.
I wanted to win no matter what it took."
Past the agitated bride, Majka sprints, the last breath, brings his friend as close as possible to the German who is already beginning to swallow the dust of the last slope, which takes away the hiccups.
33s ahead.
Less than 200 meters.
Pogacar, impatient, she obeys him.
She accelerates, accelerates, and when she is already thinking that she is left alone, Vingegaard emerges from her wheel, very strong.
The duel.
The challenge.
The sprint that Pogacar would never want to lose.
Kämna is an extra who is moved in the photo when the Dane flies past him, and then Pogacar.
He doesn't want to lose.
He doesn't lose.
“Ufff,” he says.
“It has cost me a lot.
Jonas is a tough opponent.
He has forced me to reach my limit.”
Both have climbed the Superplanche, 7 kilometers at 8.7%, in 19m 26s (at 21.6 per hour), half a minute less than the local Thibaut Pinot's record.
The last kilometer, that of the earth, at 9.5%, at 23,
1 kilometers per hour.
Behind them, the others, and Enric Mas, at 21s.
The Mallorcan, along with half a dozen other runners, runs the Endurance Tour from which one is deleted every day.
On the Planche, O'Connor, already distant, Vlasov and Nairo faltered.
But he is already ninth overall.
His Tour has just begun.
The one in Pogacar is at the top.
Past the peloton, the dust vanishes.
The oaks shine.
Pogacar descends happily.
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