Tom Dumoulin has given up his hopes for the final victory in the Tour de France after his mediocre day in the first stage through the Pyrenees. The 29-year-old Jumbo-Visma rider lost more than two minutes to his competitors in the general classification on Saturday.
“I had a hard time in the last few kilometers of the Port de Balès when Wout (van Aert, ed.) Took over from Robert (Gesink, ed.)”, Dumoulin said. “I didn’t have the legs to go with the best riders all the way to the finish. At the top of the Port de Balès I had to leave a gap, but I was still able to catch up in the descent.”
The Limburger did a lot of head work on the Col de Peyresourde, the last climb of the eighth stage, for his teammate Primoz Roglic, but he was unable to keep up when the favorites accelerated.
“I was already hanging and strangling along on the Port de Balès, so then I made the choice to take the lead for Primoz,” he said. “In the end that was too early and Primoz became isolated, but otherwise I would have gone off without a header.”
‘Felt today that Tour victory will no longer work’
Due to his bad day, Dumoulin dropped from fifth to fifteenth place in the rankings. He is now two minutes and twenty seconds behind on yellow jersey wearer Adam Yates.
“We are here to win the Tour. Initially it was the intention to do that with Primoz or with me, but I felt today that it will not work anymore”, he concluded.
Contrary to Dumoulin, Roglic did cross the line in the group with favorites in the tough mountain stage. The Slovenian occupies second place in the standings and is only three seconds behind Yates.
“I have now dropped out of the standings, but Primoz is in great shape. We started with the goal of winning the Tour and Primoz has very good cards for that, so we are now fully committed to it”, Dumoulin concluded.
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