2023-07-17 20:50:00
The Tour de France 2023 is entering the home straight. Already on Tuesday, the fight for the yellow jersey between the Dane Jonas Vingegaard and the Slovenian Tadej Pogacar on the 16th stage might come to a head in the only time trial over 22.4 kilometers from Passy to Combloux (1:00 p.m. in the live ticker).
Then on Wednesday is the king’s stage in the Alps from Saint-Gervais Mont-Blanc to Courchevel (165.7 km), which might bring the preliminary decision.
However, Eurosport expert Jens Voigt also thinks it is very possible that the 2023 tour will only be decided last weekend – possibly even in Paris.
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In an interview with Eurosport.de on the last day of rest, the 51-year-old talks regarding his week on the bike, the thrilling duel at the front and the performance of the German riders.
Expert talk at the end of the week: The big check for the yellow duel
Jens, you informed and inspired the Eurosport spectators at the Tour de France for a week live from the peloton on the motorcycle. How was it for you?
Jens Voigt: Fantastic, nerve-wracking, interesting, dangerous, intense – take your pick! (laughs) For me, as a former racer, it was almost like a comeback of sorts – only without the pain in my legs. You feel the heat, the cold, the wind. You can feel whether the road surface is bad or good. You’re very close once more and the drivers also notice you. I once passed Peter Sagan on the mountain when he was suffering. But when he saw me he called over: ‘Ey Jeeeens, shut up legs today!’ (‘Shut up legs’ is the title of Voigt’s biography, editor’s note.) The three-time world champion makes a quick joke with you, even though he’s at his limit. That’s a lot of fun then.
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But life on a motorbike isn’t that relaxed, is it?
Voigt: Let’s put it this way: It helps that I have a motorcycle driver’s license myself and know how to behave. It’s not like driving a car where you just sit and let the driver do everything. Motorcycling means work: If the driver leans to the left, you have to go with him. If he brakes, you don’t want to hit him in the back with your full body weight. So you have to think regarding it all the time. You drive behind or ahead of the field several times a day at 100-120 km/h. That’s exciting – and exhausting.
For the last week you’re going back to the Eurosport studio. Everything is at stake for the drivers following the last day of rest from Tuesday.
Voigt: This tour is pretty special. Jumbo-Visma and UAE Emirates are like two big millstones crushing the entire peloton. For many, all that is left is pain, blood and tears. It’s regarding sheer survival. For their teams, the morning bus meeting starts like this: Depending on what Jumbo and UAE are doing today, we’ll do this or that. These two superior teams dictate the race tactics of the entire peloton. That must be really frustrating for a lot of people.
In the end, a missed drinking bottle might be the decisive factor in winning the Tour.
It’s the same at the top: Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar make up the yellow jersey completely among themselves and deliver a thriller in seconds.
Voigt: It’s really super close. I also think that following the time trial on Tuesday they will continue to be very close. I can well imagine that the decision will not be made until the weekend, in the final meters so to speak. Now every little thing counts: In the end, a missed drinking bottle might be the decisive factor in winning the Tour. I’m almost assuming bets that we’ll see them in the lead group on the Champs-Élysées as well…
Tour mountains: The steep finale in the time trial on the 16th stage
What is your impression: has Vingegaard deliberately held back with attacks and used tactics lately? Pogacar was usually the more active.
Voigt: The purest and most honest dramas take place in sport. In normal life, when someone falls down next to you, you give them your hand and help them up. It’s completely different in sports: if someone stumbles here, you’ll ram the knife in them in the back. That’s why I’m sure: If one of the two had sensed a weakness in the other, they would have struck mercilessly. But it turns out that both are actually almost identically strong. They both drive with their visors open for every second.
If you had to decide – who will win the tour?
Voigt: I believe in Pogacar. Vingegaard has had a strong season so far. He won the Dauphiné convincingly. But that was five weeks ago – five weeks in which he was no longer able to build up a large form, but at most to conserve it. It’s different with Pogacar; due to his hand injury at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, he was forced to take a break, which gave his body the chance for a thorough overhaul. In the first week of the tour he still had problems with his rhythm, but now he might still have the decisive grains left for victory.
It almost takes winning the lottery for a German stage win.
What is your interim conclusion for the German drivers?
Voigt: I think we saw what we might have expected. You have to be realistic. We don’t have a classification driver who can compete with Vingegaard or Pogacar. We don’t have a sprinter who can beat Jasper Philipsen man to man in a duel. And we don’t have a specialist who can win a time trial. But: We have many very, very good racers on this tour, who all do a very, very good job in their roles.
Who are you thinking of specifically?
Voigt: Nikias Arndt helped Phil Bauhaus onto the podium three times in the sprint. Georg Zimmermann just missed out on a stage win. In Bora, Nils Politt and Emu Buchmann support their captain Jai Hindley very well, but they are not allowed to go into a group. Simon Geschke is also always there at Cofidis where he is needed. It then almost takes winning the lottery for a German stage victory. Especially since there are still a few teams that have been disappointed so far and are looking to win the day on the last few stages.
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On this tour there were several falls due to careless fans. What do you think regarding that?
Voigt: Difficult topic and not easy to find a general solution. For example, when I crashed with the Jumbo Visma driver on Sunday (Sepp Kuss, editor’s note), I say: With me, the fan would probably have been thrown on his face and not me. My generation would have stiffened the arm and shoulder to absorb the impact. Then you have a bruise on your arm, but no broken bones. Drivers today know everything regarding nutrition, regarding watts per kilo, regarding their recovery drinks. They drive faster than we ever might. But the bike handling is a bit lacking. That’s probably because the guys are out in the peloton less often than we used to be. There is training, training, training, but often only in small groups. And you notice that in such stressful situations.
Next fall shock: spectators triggers a serious mass crash
And the spectators?
Voigt: The other side is of course the misconduct of the fans. The appeal of cycling is that anyone can experience it live and up close without the cost of an entry ticket. But then you have to behave responsibly. One problem is very clear: the fans have often been there since the early morning, standing in the blazing sun all day. If there’s alcohol involved with the young guys, they’re just, I have to say, blue with a snout when we dart by at 4:00 p.m. Then they lose control of their senses and run out into the street in their strange Borat costumes. That is a big problem.
Every square centimeter of asphalt is office space for the drivers.
How might this be dealt with?
Voigt: With all love: The people should enjoy the show – and the show is the driver. There are other ways you can show them your appreciation than shoving your phone in their face or hitting every rider on the back on the hill. What the spectators need to understand better: Every square centimeter of asphalt is office space for the drivers. We also don’t want someone yelling in our face from 20 centimeters away and slapping our shoulders. That will not do! Then there is the financial dimension. There was this one scene where Pogacar was slowed down in a duel with Vingegaard because the bike in front of him was stopped by spectators. With the two top riders, ten million euros are invested in winning the Tour de France – the fans simply have to take a back seat and not influence the outcome of the race because they want to be on the road. When in doubt, they are also jeopardizing the work of an entire team. Everything that’s been a year’s work towards. That’s kind of disrespectful.
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