Tour de France Stage 20: Van Aert, Vingegaard Flex Muscle tissue and Wrap Up Tour de France Win

Jumbo Visma’s dominance of the 2022 Tour de France is almost complete… but maybe not quite.

Today’s 20th stage saw the team take the top two honors as Wout Van Aert, the race favorite, delivered the time trial victory in Rocamadour by a slim 19 second margin over his teammate, Jonas Vingegaard, who will carry the yellow jersey into Paris. Van Aert had to sweat out the stage win for some time, as credible challenges from his teammate and Geraint Thomas of INEOS included intermediate split times that were seconds behind or ahead of the Belgian. But in the finale, Thomas faltered and Vingegaard backed off after nearly crashing himself disastrously on the last descentn into the medieval village. Tadej Pogačar, winner of the two previous Tours, ended up third on the stage with a steady performance that never threatened Vingegaard but ended up besting Thomas, a reversal of the intermediate standings.

All of that left Van Aert securely in the green jersey, by a mile, and Vingegaard in yellow. The Dane also locked up the KOM jersey simply by completing the race unscathed. All that is left to navigate is a slow-moving parade into Paris and a brief criterium where Jumbo Visma will undoubtedly put him at the front, safely, until the hostilities have ceased at the 3km mark. Then there will be that last bit of unfinished business where Van Aert seeks out one last moment of glory.

One last bit of news was the ascent of Alexandr Vlasov, as the Bora rider put together a decent effort in successful pursuit of Louis Meintjes of Intermarché and Nairo Quintana of Arkea Samsic, both of whom fell behind Vlasov on GC. The Russian-born Vlasov, who is switching to French nationality following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, made up for having to leave the Tour de Suisse last month while in the overall lead, having bounced back from Covid and some early troubles at this Tour to improve to fifth overall.

Results:

1. Wout van Aert Jumbo-Visma, 47:59
2. Jonas Vingegaard Jumbo-Visma, + 19
3. Tadej Pogacar UAE Team Emirates, + 27
4. Geraint Thomas INEOS Grenadiers, + 32
5. Filippo Ganna INEOS Grenadiers, + 42
6. Bauke Mollema Trek-Segafredo, + 01:22
7. Mattia Cattaneo Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl Team, + 01:25
8. Fred Wright Bahrain Victorious, + 01:32
9. Maximilian Schachmann BORA-hansgrohe, + 01:37
10. Jan Tratnik Bahrain Victorious, + 01:48

GC

1. Jonas Vingegaard Jumbo-Visma, 76:33:57
2. Tadej Pogacar UAE Team Emirates, + 03:34
3. Geraint Thomas INEOS Grenadiers, + 08:13
4. David Gaudu Groupama-FDJ, + 13:56
5. Aleksandr Vlasov BORA-hansgrohe, + 16:3706
6. Nairo Quintana Team Arkéa-Samsic, + 17:24
7. Romain Bardet Team DSM, + 19:02
8. Louis Meintjes Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert, + 19:12
9. Alexey Lutsenko Astana Qazaqstan Team, + 23:47
10. Adam Yates INEOS Grenadiers, + 25:43

Lacapelle-Marival – Rocamadour 40.7 km Timetrial

A solid long TT in the Tour this year. Barring major upsets the top 10 should be fairly fixed though so the fight for the stage win should be the main attraction today.

Expected finish: 17:50 CEST (last rider)

Pletwals of the Day : Filippo Ganna

Ganna’s “rested” legs vs. the “rhinoceros on crack”-form of Wout van Aert should be the story of the day. My bet is Ganna and Ineos needs it more and that makes the difference even if third-week form and momentum should never really be underestimated in final TdF timetrials.

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