Jonas Vingegaard, as if bored, gets up from the saddle and stretches his body.
Pogacar stares straight ahead.
The road is vertical.
McNulty pedals.
Demolition man
in action since the middle of the climb to Val Louron, 20 kilometers, already, Pogacar's American friend has turned the peloton into rubble, tough cyclists, the best in the world, big names that are dying begging for mercy, Geraint Thomas, Nairo Quintana , Enric Mas… At his wheel, the one in white, the one in yellow.
Duel is a game of pride.
A preowned port, old cycling.
Peyragudes, half the old Peyresourde, the first Pyrenean pass that the Tour climbed, 112 years ago, and the peloton left Bagnères de Luchon at midnight, half the climb to a mountain landing strip, 1,580 meters high, and a wall that was added 10 years ago and inaugurated by Valverde.
Vingegaard, the one in yellow, and getting closer to Paris, plays 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 does not flinch.
He speaks through the earpiece.
500 meters left.
He waits for his time.
The wall, the wall.
The Koppenberg of Flanders, but with smooth asphalt and sun, in July, not in April, and in the Pyrenees, where he wants to show the arriving Dane who is the best, as he did in Flanders with Van der Poel, the king of the places.
McNulty is consumed by accelerating even more.
16% slope.
300 meters.
Pride launches Pogacar.
A pier.
Vingegaard sticks, adheres, his wheel is a magnet.
He waits for his time.
Duel is a waiting game.
There are 175 meters to go when Vingegaard responds.
The signal that Pogacar was waiting for, rewarded, dynamite that goes back with 100 to go. He wins the stage as he won it, the same as in the Planche des Belles Filles, so long ago that it seems that it happened in another Tour, and Pogacar was untouchable, and looked like.
The duel.
the same as in the Planche des Belles Filles, so long ago that it seems that it happened in another Tour, and Pogacar was untouchable, and it seemed so.
The duel.
the same as in the Planche des Belles Filles, so long ago that it seems that it happened in another Tour, and Pogacar was untouchable, and it seemed so.
The duel.
At the finish line, they shake hands.
Handsome boys.
healthy young people.
Athletes.
Pogacar lays out how long he is on the asphalt, he showers on his helmet, his protruding locks, the shark's fins that he feels, with San Pellegrino,
acqua gassata,
served by Joseba, his masseuse.
Vingegaard pedals on the roller, degreases himself.
He talks on the phone with Trine, his girlfriend, who reminds him of what she reminds him of every day, above all, don't read the newspapers, eh?, and he answers laconically, showing no 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 emotion, the force that mobilizes everyone.
“I have won for them.
And tomorrow, the big day, we will leave more motivated than ever”.
The hope.
Hautacam.
Vingegaard, at 2m 18s, four seconds closer, the bonus.
"And I'm sure that if today, in the Pyrenees, Majka, Bennett, Soler had been there... we would have made Vingegaard give in," adds the Slovenian, in a show of unprecedented weakness and tears.
“We have had very bad luck, but even so we are going to continue to give 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 was a tough day, but perfect for me."
Pogacar's team, the UAE, are four, and one of them, Hirschi, is lame.
In the morning, in Saint Gaudens, they are sunk.
Two left due to covid;
Marc Soler, also sick, arrived the day before out of control, a voluntary ordeal, a penance for not having resisted, and at the Péguère Wall, his fetish, Majka, the Pole who most encourages and amuses him, is injured because he pedals so hard that he breaks the chain of his bike on the highest slope.
There are four left and they respond by being a better team than ever, seizing the stage, turning it into 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 peloton, so packed until then, drops to 20 soon after.
50 kilometers left.
A descent, and Val Louron, where McNulty enters,
Psycho
and her motel by Janet Leigh, who does the rest.
One by one, they all hang up.
three left.
In the Aspin cloudy and cool for a summer day of horror, where the paradise of climbers begins, the Tour is a game of champions from before, a shadow of what they were.
From Froome, who tries to escape, from Pinot, from Bardet, from whom they will never be again but who refuse to accept it.
They look for tears like chickpeas on the faces of the fans.
Emotion.
Nairo is also from his generation, but he looks younger than a year ago, than three years ago.
With more vitality.
He fights for a podium position that, this year, when he is already 32, would be a victory, he would not have the bitter taste of the podiums that he achieved when the yellow dream of him.
July 20th.
Colombian day.
More motivated than ever, the Tunja lion is also giving in, one of those who make up the platoon of those who make the Tour a game of resistance.
and ahead,
All find applause and oblivion.
The Tour, the best Tour in many years, is the duel.
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