Vegard Stake Laengen, a crucial support rider for the UAE Emirates team of race leader Tadej Pogacar, fell victim to Covid infection as the Tour de France peloton approached the Alps.
“Vegard tested negative yesterday morning, but he experienced sore throat symptoms late Friday night,” Adriano Rotunno, the team doctor, stated. “The Covid-19 antigen test was positive, and this morning’s PCR test confirmed the diagnosis. By policy and to ensure his, the team’s, and the peloton’s safety, he will be removed from the race.”
A second rider, AG2R Citron’s Geoffrey Bouchard, who won the mountains classification at the 2019 Vuelta an Espaa and the 2021 Giro d’Italia, tested positive and withdrew.
“I did not feel good during the stage on Friday,” Bouchard remarked. It was a major letdown because we were just about to reach my preferred area, the mountains.
Pogacar compared Laengen’s departure to a locomotive. “He was the team’s biggest and strongest rider, pulling on the flat, the climbs, and everywhere else,” said the defending champion. “It will be difficult without him, but I believe we can reach Paris with seven riders.
“Each day we are on the road, climbing. There are so many people screaming, which I enjoy, but it raises your risk of contracting a virus. I hope this is the end and that we remain safe till the end.”
With Covid already present in two teams, the peloton is now bracing for more bad news, as all teams will be subjected to Covid testing on Monday during the rest day in Morzine. Rod Ellingworth, the team manager for Geraint Thomas’s Ineos Grenadiers, displayed incredible foresight on Friday when he suggested that Pogacar’s team was struggling. He stated, “It appears to me that they are not operating at full capacity. I’m unsure, but are they ill?”
Saturday, Ellingworth lamented the lack of uniformity in Covid safety procedures across the top teams. “We have quite stringent protocols,” he remarked, “but I believe there is a tremendous disparity across the teams. Some teams are far more relaxed. Some teams do not use masks, while others do.”
Thomas won the Tour of Switzerland in June even though fewer than half of the starting field of 153 finished the race after Covid positives spread across the peloton. “In Switzerland, there was undoubtedly a problem among the peloton,” Ellingworth stated. “This is the reason so many dropped out. But none of us are above this, and self-policing is necessary.
Ellingworth and his riders, along with seven other elite teams, are being followed by a Netflix film crew, which has created its challenges. “The staff is constantly with us. During this race, our entire crew had to be replaced because one of its members tested positive for performance-enhancing substances. Therefore, there are numerous avenues for its dissemination.
Saturday’s stage from Dole to Lausanne was won by Wout van Aert of Jumbo-Wissa, who won his second stage of the race by outsprinting Michael Matthews of Team BikeExchange on the Lausanne heights overlooking Lac Leman.
As the race neared the streets of the Olympic capital, a two-man escape, which included Britain’s Fred Wright, was swallowed up by the swift peloton. The 23-year-old Londoner had dropped his final companion, Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl’s Mattia Cattaneo, but as the pack neared the final five kilometers and began the steep climb to the finish, Wright of Bahrain Victorious was finally caught, allowing the Belgian Van Aert a chance to win.
An earlier mass collision, which occurred only 10 kilometers into the stage, was the deadliest of the Tour so far. The day’s most unfortunate rider was Thibaut Pinot, who crashed on the descent of the Col de Pétra Félix and was then hit in the face by a Trek-Segafredo teammate who was dishing out beverages to his colleagues but still managed to complete the stage.
