The entire peloton of the Tour de France tested negative for Covid-19 during the rest day on Monday as Geraint Thomas and his Ineos Grenadiers team faced up to a near-impossible job in containing the imperious double Tour winner, Tadej Pogacar, in the forthcoming triptych of mountain stages.
Despite himself and two teammates being within two minutes of the defending champion Pogacar in the overall standings, Thomas was effusive about the challenge posed by the Slovenian. “He can ride on the cobbles, he can do everything,” the 2018 Tour champion said. “He’s phenomenal.”
Normally on Tour de France rest days the talk would be bullish, of all the opportunities to come and the challenges of the stages ahead. Instead, with Pogacar looking close to unbeatable, most of his rivals, including Thomas, could do little other than marvel at his superiority.
“A lot of people have been praised in the past and said: ‘This guy will go on to win X,’ but I can’t see how Pogacar won’t continue to be the biggest favourite in the next five or six years.”
With almost two weeks of racing left, the Welshman was hardly throwing in the towel but his assessment of his hopes of beating the UAE Team Emirates rider were laced with barely concealed resignation.
“I think he’s just a level above,” Thomas said. “Vincenzo Nibali and Alberto Contador were great climbers and Contador improved his time trialling a lot. Froomey [Chris Froome] could do both really well, but Pogacar, he’s got everything else.”
With a trio of summit finishes coming on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, it would take an almost unprecedented collapse or mishap for Pogacar to be dethroned. In fact, the expectation is that at Megève altiport on Tuesday, the Col du Granon on Wednesday, and on Alpe d’Huez on Thursday, the 23-year-old will double down on his dominance.
Pogacar’s appetite seems insatiable, his energies unrelenting. His dominance has already brought comparisons with Eddy Merckx, and – less flatteringly – with Lance Armstrong, whose series of seven straight wins ended in a humiliating confession to doping.
The major obstacle to a third Tour win might have been another Covid positive case within his team, with Vegard Stake Laengen having dropped out with the virus on Saturday. That threat, for now at least, has gone.
More positive cases had been expected following the peloton-wide testing, but all riders were given a clean bill of health, including those at Cofidis and AG2R-Citroën, two teams that had also sustained withdrawals due to the virus.
In a statement, the UCI, world cycling’s governing body, said: “In accordance with the rules for the organisation of road cycling competitions in the context of the coronavirus pandemic all riders participating in the Tour de France were tested on the evening of 10 July. All tests were negative.”
