Geraint Thomas will spearhead Ineos Grenadiers’ assault on Tadej Pogacar’s grip on the coveted yellow jersey in the 2022 Tour de France, which starts in Copenhagen on Friday with a 13km time trial through the streets of the Danish capital.
The 36-year-old Welshman, who will be backed by teammates Daniel Martínez and Adam Yates, is in resurgent form after ending a barren spell with victory in the Tour de Suisse and the 2018 champion accepted that he was a contender, rather than a clear favourite, to overthrow the 23-year-old leader of the UAE Emirates team.
“We don’t have the favourite in the race,” Thomas said. “In the past we always had [Chris] Froome, or Brad [Wiggins], myself or Egan [Bernal]. We’ve always had one of the big favourites going into the start. Now we all know it’s Pogacar and Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma) in the last couple of years.”
The Slovenian pair have between them won four of the last seven Grand Tours of France, Italy and Spain, with Ineos riders winning the 2020 and 2021 Giros, but only in their absence. Yet Ineos remain bullish about their chances, with the team manager, Rod Ellingworth, insisting that Pogacar, in line for a hat-trick of Tour wins, can be beaten.
“If you think he can’t be beaten, then you may as well not start,” Ellingworth said. Thomas, runner-up in 2019, was wary of making big predictions. “Switzerland showed I was in decent shape, so we’ll see how it goes here,” he said. “We’ve got a super-strong team. The main thing is we ride together, we’re aggressive together and we ride off each other, which is what we’ve done all year.”
“I’ve won the race and I’ve come second,” he said of his own Tour record. “I’m a lot closer to the end of my career now than the start. I’ve got a lot of experience and I just want to enjoy these races now. Since November, Dani and Adam have been the leaders of the team and it’s still that way.
“I’m going well and I want to be there in the mix to help them, and to take opportunities if they come. I’m pretty chilled.”
However, the team’s triple-leadership tactic backfired in 2021, when crashes, disappointing form and Pogacar’s supremacy in the mountain stages relegated Richard Carapaz to third place in Paris and Thomas to a lowly 41st overall.
Thomas acknowledged that defeating Pogacar and Roglic would require guile, as well as strength. “We can’t ride it the same way [as in the past],” he said. “We can’t pull all day, set a tempo and then go man versus man to beat them. But we’ve got a strong team, we’ve got numbers, and hopefully we can use them at right moments. That’s a big change.”
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Yates, meanwhile, has recovered from a bout of Covid and expects to play a key role, as the race progresses. “I had three or four days that were quite bad,” he said. “I had proper fever and chills. I had to miss some key [preparation] but luckily for me I usually manage to get fit quite quickly. I don’t need too much time, but we’ll find out in the time trial on Friday.”
The 29-year-old will not be alone in hoping that Covid has not hampered his Tour buildup, with multiple riders having recently tested positive, including Thibaut Pinot, who is making his return to the Tour since he abandoned the race in tears in 2019. The Frenchman however has now been cleared to compete.
