After a gutsy performance in Stage 11 of the 2022 Tour de France in the Alps, Jonas Vingegaard from Jumbo-Visma won his first-ever stage and secured first place in the overall general classification standings. Vingegaard is now the betting favorite to win the Tour de France, ahead of Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) who coughed up the yellow jersey, and slipped to third place in the GC standings and saw his 2022 Le Tour odds slip to +300.

Tadej Pogacar (right) and Jonas Vingegaard (left) battling in Stage 11 of the 2022 Tour de France for a second year in a row. (Image: Getty)

In early June a month before the start of the 2022 Tour de France in Denmark, Pogacar was the consensus favorite at -165 odds to secure a third-straight yellow jersey. At that point, Vingegaard was the third-highest cyclist on the board at +550 odds behind teammate Primoz Roglic at +250 odds.

Pogacar finally seized the yellow jersey after winning Stage 6 and his odds to lock up a three-peat were -400, and you could’ve backed Vingegaard to win the Tour de France at +300 odds at that juncture.

Vingegaard Second Place in 2021

Vingegaard had an impressive rookie performance during his first ever Tour de France last summer. He was regarded as a magnificent climber and an up-and-coming star with Jumbo-Visma — one of the premier teams based out of the Netherlands — but he was supposed to be a domestique supporting Primoz Roglic in the 2021 Tour de France.

After Roglic suffered two nasty crashes in the first few days of Le Tour, he ended up dropping out by the time the peloton reached the first mountain stages. At that point, the team director decided to make Vingegaard the main focus in the GC standings. With Pogacar successfully defending his first championship early into the 2021 Tour de France, it was a race for second place between Jumbo-Visma and Ineos Grenadiers.

Jumbo-Visma did everything possible to make sure Vingegaard would be standing on the second step on the final podium in Paris at the conclusion of the 2021 Tour de France. Vingegaard finished in second place, but 5:20 behind Pogacar in the final GC standings.

Roglic or Vingegaard in 2022?

Coming into the 2022 Tour de France, Jumbo-Visma had one of the strongest teams with two potential GC contenders with Roglic and Vingegaard. They figured they would let the course determine which one would be the one the rest of the team support, but Roglic had seniority and his window to finally win a yellow jersey was getting smaller with each passing season.

Wout van Aert secured the yellow jersey early in Le Tour and he also secured enough points to snag te coveted green jersey for the top sprinter in the peloton. However, Jumbo-Visma still planned on preventing Pogacar from winning a third consecutive championship.

An unlucky Roglic crashed in the cobblestones in Stage 5 and had to pop a dislocated shoulder back in. Roglic fell behind Pogacar by two-plus minutes, while Vingegaard was withing striking distance. Heading into the second week of the Tour de France, it was obvious that Jumbo-Visma was going all-in on Vingegaard while Roglic took over super domestique duties.

Jumbo-Visma is one of the strongest teams in all of cycling, especially with the squad that they sent to the Tour de France that also includes van Aert, Roglic, Vingegaard, Steven Kruijswijk, Christophe Laporte, Nathan Van Hooydonck, and American Sepp Kuss. It was a full team effort in Stage 11 to wear down Pogacar and cut into his lead.

Dropping Pogacar

At the onset of Stage 11, Van Aert joined the first breakaway, while the rest of the team played cat and mouse games with Pogacar — who was essentially solo because two members of UAE Team Emirates were out with COVID.

Pogacar spent too much energy to get ahead of the attacks, and when Vingegaard made his move on the hellacious ascent of Col du Granon with less than 5 km to the finish line, Pogacar had nothing in the tank to stay on his wheel.

Vingegaard began Stage 11 trailing Pogacar by 39 seconds, and goal was to trim the deficit. Of course, when Jumbo-Visma saw the Pogacar bonked on the final climb, Vingegaard went full gas to the finish line. He had built up a 90-second gap which expanded to a 2:51 by the time Pogacar crossed the finish line. With a ten-second time bonus for first place, Vingegaard seized the yellow jersey and built up a lead of 2:22.

Despite the awful Stage 11, Pogacar felt confident he could make the time up in Stage 12 during a summit finish at the historic Alpe D’Huez.

“It’s not over yet,” said Pogacar. “I lose today three minutes, maybe tomorrow I gain three minutes. I’ll keep fighting until the end. I want to race until the end – I want to give it everything and to have no regrets.”

“I still see Pogacar as maybe the biggest competitor and I expect he will try to attack me every day when he has the chance,” said Vingegaard. “For sure, it will be a hard race from now until Paris, but we’ll just do our best every day.”

The bookies think otherwise and installed Vingegaard as the new betting favorite to ride into Paris with the yellow jersey and win the 2022 Tour de France at -330 odds.

🔝 Jonas Vingegaard does the double in an incredible stage!

🎬 Watch the last KM now!

🔝 Jonas Vingegaard fait coup double après une étape sensationnelle !

🎬 Revivez le dernier KM#TDF2022 | @Continental_fr pic.twitter.com/zPG7g4c2QH

— Tour de France™ (@LeTour) July 13, 2022

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