[1/3] Cycling - Tour de France - Stage 17 - Saint-Gervais Mont Blanc to Courchevel - France - July 19, 2023 AG2R Citroen Team's Felix Gall celebrates as he crosses the finish line to win stage 17 REUTERS/Stephane MaheCOURCHEVEL, France, July 19 (Reuters) - Jonas Vingegaard made a giant stride towards a second consecutive Tour de France title when crash-hit rival Tadej Pogacar cracked in the toughest stage of the race on Wednesday.
What was a 10-second gap two days ago is now an unbridgeable 7:35 gap after Pogacar huffed and puffed over the line more than five minutes behind Jumbo-Visma leader Vingegaard.
"I'm relieved to have more than seven minutes but we're not in Paris yet, there's some tricky stages left, still," said Vingegaard.
Vingegaard slowed down and zig-zagged through to continue his demolition work until the line, which he crossed with a big smile on his face.
Also why do they let cars pass us when the gap between the groups of riders is just 15 seconds?"
Persons:
Gervais Mont, Team's Felix Gall, Stephane Mahe COURCHEVEL, Jonas Vingegaard, Tadej Pogacar, Vingegaard, la, Felix Gall of Austria, Saint Gervais, I'm, Pogacar, Benoot, Marc Soler, Griescha Niermann, Jonas, Thibaut Pinot, Julien Pretot, David Goodman, Mike Harrison
Organizations:
de, de France, UAE Emirates, Thomson
Locations:
Gervais Mont Blanc, Courchevel, France, Saint, Paris