Geraint Thomas is a decent time trial away from another podium finish at the Tour de France – and a view from all three steps.
If Britain's 2018 Yellow Jersey winner enjoys a fair wind on the 25-mile run from Lacapelle-Marival to Rocamadour on Saturday, it would be his third visit in five years to the close-of-play rostrum on the Champs Elysees.
Unlike ITV's monument to 1980s prime-time quiz show naffness 3-2-1, Thomas is set to complete the sequence in the opposite order. But at 36, he should follow former team-mate Chris Froome among the rare cyclists to finish first, second and third on the Tour de France.
As Thomas rolled home safely in the peloton on stage 19, with a three-minute cushion to David Gaudu in fourth place on the general classification, his place as “best of the rest” behind champion-in-waiting Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar looked assured.
Christened 'Thomas the flank engine' by one inspired headline writer seven years ago, the 2018 BBC Sports Personality of the Year was a selfless wingman as Va Va Froome won four Yellow Jerseys between 2013-17. On the first of those long hauls as Froome's minder on the roads, he even rode 2,000 miles to Paris with a bust pelvis after a heavy crash in Corsica.
Thomas was assured of his place in Le Tour's pantheon when he capitalised on his own form, and Froome's fatigue after his solo breakaway to glory in the Giro d'Italia two months earlier, to land cycling's most-coveted fashion accessory four years ago.
And despite a litany of hard-luck stories, mainly crashes and punctures, he was runner-up to team-mate Egan Bernal 12 months later.
Now, despite the march of Father Time and conceding 11 and 13 years to Vingegaard and Pogacar respectively, he is the only man within 10 minutes of them – and he does not think his team, Ineos Grenadiers, invested enough belief in his staying power.
“I always believed – not many other people did, to be honest, but I always believed I had the legs to do something,” Thomas told Velonews.com. “With these two (Vingegaard and Pogacar) in front of me, there's not a lot I could have done about that, but it's nice to be best of the rest.
“It does give you some motivation... (people) making out that they think I’m crap. Maybe it’s about my age and stuff, but it’s nice to be riding well and being up there.”
Christophe Laporte claimed his maiden stage win, and Jumbo-Visma's fifth of this year's race, on the 117-mile flat stage 19 to Cahors.
