Overview
- Tadej Pogacar extends his lead to 4 minutes 24 seconds over Jonas Vingegaard after the shortened 19th stage, leaving him all but certain to claim a fourth Tour de France win.
- On stage 19 into La Plagne, Florian Lipowitz finished fourth and widened his gap over Oscar Onley to 1 minute 03 seconds, securing third overall and the White Jersey.
- Lipowitz’s current buffer follows a brutal 18th stage on the Col de la Loze when his lead briefly shrank from around two minutes to just 22 seconds.
- As the first German with a realistic shot at a Tour podium since Andreas Klöden in 2006, Lipowitz’s breakthrough has sparked comparisons to Jan Ullrich that his camp views as premature.
- John Wakefield, Lipowitz’s trainer at Red Bull–Bora-hansgrohe, cautioned that undue pressure from such comparisons could impede the young rider’s development with two stages remaining.