Jonas Vingegaard is not the only rider on a successful comeback trail at Visma-Lease A Bike in this year's Tour de France and Belgian star Wout van Aert provided the cycling world with another reminder of that at Pau, where he claimed second on a frantic reduced bunch sprint behind fellow-Belgian Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck).
Van Aert's bad crash during Dwars door Vlaanderen in March forced him to skip his original target for the first half of the season, the Giro d'Italia. But with a third, a sixth, a fourth and now two second places in this year's Tour de France, Van Aert is clearly in flying form in his alternative pathway towards the fast-approaching Olympic Games. That his latest success came in the same city of Pau where he suffered a massive crash and injuries in the 2019 Tour de France during a time trial only helped underline that fact.
Nor was it only the sprint near-miss that gave Van Aert extra encouragement on Friday. Throughout the entire stage, run off at a ferocious speed after Adam Yates (UAE Team Emirates) got away in an echelon, Van Aert had been in the thick of the action.
He both wrenched the peloton apart when Visma-Lease a Bike opted to chase down the Briton's move and then chased down some late breakaways after a large front group formed before sprinting to second for a second day running. All in all, perhaps the best signs yet of fast-rising form for the Belgian allrounder.
"It was a really classic fight - some wind, hilly terrain and flat-out racing from the gun, so I really enjoyed it and also as a team, we were really good," Van Aert told reporters.
He agreed that for Visma, the early echelon with Yates "was not a great group for us to have there in front, both for the stage win and Yates pushing to take back time on GC. It was not easy to control those situations but we were quick to react to the crosswinds, we knew we wanted to put the other guys in the gutter and that's what we did."
"So we were always confident we could make it back and it was also in my favour to have a hard race. In the end, the boys really controlled the race to make sure it was a sprint. So it's a shame I couldn't pull it off."
Van Aert had vociferously complained about Philipsen's sprinting last week when the Alpecin-Deceuninck racer was relegated because of an irregular manoeuvre. But he had no such complaints this time.
"I came out in front just a little too early, after the team did a great job," Van Aert recounted. "[Teammate Christophe] Laporte did a great job, but at a certain point he couldn't keep up there, as is normal, and I was out there in the wind just a bit too early."
"I had to wait a little bit at 350 metres to go because that would have been way too early. Then Philipsen came flying past me and afterwards, it was impossible to pass him. But it was a fair sprint."
"We'd rather win than finish second, of course," said sports director Grischa Niermann, "but we can be proud of Wout and the whole team did a great job. The sprints are also a goal now with Wout because he is feeling good, and as he's shown with two second places. I think he'd rather change those two places to one first place, but it is like it is, he was really close and there will be more chances for him to come."
Given his vastly and quickly improving condition, the question arises of what Van Aert will be capable of doing in the two mountain stages which the Tour will tackle this weekend. He agreed that he would like to be supporting Vingegaard again, but the Belgian said, he's also got his own targets in the eight stages remaining.
"I hope to play my role supporting Jonas, and another mountain race starts tomorrow [Saturday]. But I also hope to win a stage at this point, because in the second week of the Tour, I have felt good. It's close, it's in the legs, but you also have to show you can do it on the bike."
