ROCAMADOUR: Jonas Vingegaard survived a near fall on Saturday’s individual time-trial to virtually wrap up the 2022 Tour de France title and now only needs to cross the Champs-Elysees finish line in Paris on Sunday to guarantee the champion’s yellow jersey.

Team Jumbo’s Vingegaard tops the overall standings 3min 34sec ahead of two-time defending champion Tadej Pogacar, while Geraint Thomas of Ineos Grenadiers, the 2018 winner, stands third at 8min 13sec.

Frenchman David Gaudu of FDJ and and Aleksandr Vlasov of Bora rouud out the virtual top five ahead of Sunday’s stage, a largely processional ride from La Defense to the Champs Elysees in Paris.

Saturday’s time-trial was won by Wout van Aert ahead of Danish team-mate Vingegaard, meaning the team have six wins, the yellow jersey, the green sprint jersey and the polka dot climb jersey.

Van Aert clocked a best time of 47 minutes 59 seconds. Vingegaard finished 19 seconds behind Van Aert with Pogacar taking third place, 27 seconds off the pace.

Two years ago, Pogacar famously overturned a 57-second deficit on the penultimate day time-trial on La Planche des Belles Filles to snatch victory from Primoz Roglic.

But on Saturday, Vingegaard flew down the ramp last of the 139 surviving riders and set a relentlessly high pace through the baking country roads meaning a battle of nerves with Pogacar never really emerged.

He did, however, suffer a late wobble, losing his back wheel which slid over gravel into a gutter, but just managed to right himself.

Published in Dawn, July 24th, 2022