Bernal in position to win Tour
VAL THORENS, France — Perpetuating the tradition of great Colombian climbers, Egan Bernal left his mark on the Tour de France in the mountains. But unlike his flashy predecessors, he is also poised to win cycling’s biggest race.
Bernal kept the yellow jersey Saturday after the last Alpine stage, and barring a crash or a lastminute health issue, he will become the first Colombian to win the Tour when it ends on Paris’ Champs-elysees with a largely processional stage on Sunday.
At age 22, Bernal will also become the youngest post-world War II winner of the Tour.
“I still need to reach Paris, but today it was incredible, I can’t believe it. I will need some more days to understand what happened to me,” Bernal said.
This year’s route, the highest in race history with five summit finishes, including three stages finishing above 1,242 miles and only 33 miles of time trialing, gave natural born climber Bernal a golden opportunity.
Unlike Bradley Wiggins, four-time champion Chris Froome and Geraint Thomas — the three other riders who won the Tour for the British outfit Ineos — Bernal is not a race-against-the-clock specialist. He has built his success on consistent performances in the Pyrenees and a tremendous attack in the Alps after losing ground in the individual time trial.
Thomas, lagging 1 minute and 11 seconds behind overall, should finish runner-up to give the Ineos team a 1-2 finish in Paris.
Weighing only 130 pounds, the superlight Bernal thrived in rarefied air, and it was fitting that he delivered his fatal blow in the Col de l’iseran, the Tour’s highest point this year at 1,721 miles.
Bernal took the race lead Friday when Stage 19 was cut short by a landslide across the route to the Alpine ski station of Tignes and by a hailstorm that made road conditions too icy for riders. He’d moved away from Julian Alaphilippe, who led for 14 days, on a climb to the Iseran. When the race was then stopped with Bernal racing away on the downhill, organizers decided the riders’ timings to the top of the Iseran climb would be used to determine the overall standings.
And that put Bernal in yellow and on course to become the first Colombian to win the Tour.
Bernal wrapped up his victory during Saturday’s Stage 20 to Val Thorens. Shortened to just 36 miles because of landslide on the route, it featured a 20-mile climb up to the ski station that was too difficult for Alaphilippe, who cracked after starting the day in second place and fell all the way to fifth, behind Steven Kruijswijk and Emanuel Buchmann.