Belgian Wout van Aert on Tuesday produced a solo break for the ages to win stage 4 of the Tour de France and extend his overall lead in swashbuckling style.
After coming second on each of the first three stages in Denmark, the Jumbo-Visma man finally tasted victory when he crossed the finish line in Calais, 8 seconds ahead of the fast-closing peloton.
Van Aert’s feat was a rare act of brilliance that is likely to live long in the memory, and makes up for the disappointment of his three narrow misses.
Photo: Reuters
“It seems almost impossible, the jersey gave me wings, but we planned it, both for the GC [general classification] and the green jersey, there were 50 points today” said Van Aert, the overall leader who also tops the sprint standings. “They say third time lucky, but for me it was the fourth.”
There was nothing lucky about it. After 160km dominated by two escapees, Van Aert’s Jumbo team and Adam Yates’ Ineos Grenadiers launched a blistering attack on a short, steep climb about 10km from the finish.
Dressed in his luminous yellow outfit as race leader, Van Aert crossed the summit first and alone after a relentless scrap up the incline.
He then powered over the final 8km at speeds of up to 55kph, waving his arms in mock flight at the finish.
“This is an exceptional, a really special moment,” Van Aert said.
Behind him, Alpecin-Deceuninck rider Jasper Philipsen won a bunch sprint for second and briefly celebrated believing he had won the stage.
“It’s a shame for Philipsen, we shouldn’t laugh at him,” Van Aert said.
Philipsen soon found out the painful truth.
“I thought I’d won for about 5 seconds. It’ll look funny watching replays in years to come,” he said.
Van Aert leads stage 1 winner Yves Lampaert by 25 seconds in the overall standings, while defending champion Tadej Pogacar is third at 32 seconds.
Japan’s Shohei Ohtani is the record-breaking baseball “superhuman” following in the footsteps of the legendary Babe Ruth who has also earned comparisons to US sporting greats Michael Jordan and Tom Brady. Not since Ruth a century ago has there been a baseball player capable of both pitching and hitting at the top level. The 30-year-old’s performances with the Los Angeles Dodgers have consolidated his position as a baseball legend in the making, and a national icon in his native Japan. He continues to find new ways to amaze, this year becoming the first player to hit 50 home runs and steal 50 bases
Zhang Shuai yesterday said that she nearly quit after losing 24 matches in a row — now the world No. 595 is into the quarter-finals of her home China Open. The 35-year-old is to face Spain’s Paula Badosa as the lowest-ranked player to reach this stage in the history of the tournament after Badosa reeled off 11 of the last 12 games in a 6-4, 6-0 victory over US Open finalist Jessica Pegula. Zhang went into Beijing on a barren run lasting more than 600 days and her string of singles defeats was the second-longest on the WTA Tour Open era, which
Francesco Bagnaia yesterday profited from a mistake by rookie Pedro Acosta to win the Japan MotoGP sprint and close the gap on overall championship leader, Jorge Martin. Spaniard Acosta crashed with four laps to go while leading the field at Motegi, allowing defending world champion Bagnaia to take first ahead of Enea Bastianini and Marc Marquez. Spain’s Martin finished fourth and saw his overall lead over Italian Bagnaia in the championship standings cut to 15 points. “I am very happy because with these conditions, it’s not very easy to win and gain points,” Bagnaia said after a sprint race that took place under
Naomi Osaka is braced for a “battle” after yesterday setting up a clash with Coco Gauff in the round-of-16 of the China Open, while top seed Aryna Sabalenka also marched on. Osaka defeated 60th-ranked American Katie Volynets 6-3, 6-2 and next faces Gauff in a showdown of former US Open champions in Beijing. World No. 2 Sabalenka swatted aside Ashlyn Krueger 6-2, 6-2 for her 14th consecutive victory and plays another American in 24th-ranked Madison Keys. Looking ahead to the Gauff meeting, four-time Grand Slam champion Osaka said: “She’s very athletic, obviously.” “For me, my strongest traits are being aggressive and also my serve,
RSS