This is what the Tour de France is.
It’s Jonas Abrahamsen, 29-years-old, not even a WorldTour rider, winner of only two bike races before – the last one 13 months ago, and the other one against riders you’ve never heard of – winning a helter-skelter stage 11 of the Tour de France.
It’s being a rider whose weight problems were so bad that it delayed his puberty.
It’s going against the grain of being lighter, and instead gaining 20 kilograms to a) be healthier and b) to be competitive in bike races.
It’s adding all that extra muscle and then switching from being a climber to a stocky, puncheur. No more mountain dreams; just breakaway and Classics dreams. “If I didn’t have a big change with my weight I would never be in the Tour de France and winning a stage,” he said.
It’s leading a two-nation team with only riders from Norway and Denmark and being their leader, even when they’ve got storied riders like Alexander Kristoff and Magnus Cort.
It’s featuring in the breakaway on four stages of his first ever Tour de France, and finishing third in one of those days.
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It’s returning the next year and going back into the break on the first day of racing, and riding into the King of the Mountains jersey and green jersey on day one.
It’s holding onto green for three days and the polka dots for 10 days.
It’s riding solo for 170km on one day when no one else wanted to go up the road, but he did because it’s the Tour de France and every bike rider has an obligation to honour the race and any classification jersey they find themselves wearing.
It’s becoming so synonymous with the polka dots that when he loses it the PA speaker announces the new wearer on stage as “Jonas Pogačar”.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
It’s going back in three more breaks after his stint in the KOM jersey because his race isn’t done yet and this means everything.
It’s being addicting to suffering, to pushing the body to its limits. “I just love pain,” he once said.
It’s promising to do it all again the next year but then breaking his collarbone one week before the race. “I wasn’t thinking the Tour de France was possible,” he accepted. “But if you don’t have hope, you don’t go to the Tour de France and win a stage.”
It’s then miraculously recovering in time to be on the startline, ready to go to war again with the race he’s now a darling in. “The next day [after his injury] I was given some hope which gave me motivation, and then I went on the rollers every day, getting better and better.”
It’s attacking from the second kilometre on stage 11 and staying out front with other escapees even when attacks reigned down from behind, and the shadows of Tadej Pogačar, Jonas Vingegaard, Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert menacingly loomed.
It’s being the first one from the break to attack with 15km to go, and only bringing one rider – Mauro Schmid – with him. “In the Tour de France there are so many good riders so you have to gamble a little bit. If I don’t gamble, I don’t win the stage. I was 100% gambling.”
It’s holding off a furious chase from Van der Poel, the very same man who has made a career of sweeping in on his prey and devouring them like a malnourished Dutch vulture.
It’s not being cowed by the bigger players, the teams with double and triple his team’s budgets, and not being afraid to throw everything on the line and attack, attack, attack.
It’s beating Schmid in a finish line sprint, a winner of nine pro races – seven more than him.
It’s the sizable and vocal Norwegian crowd erupting into chants of ‘campeones olé olé olé’ and ‘Uno-X, Uno-X’ that are so loud that journalists can’t hear the people their interviewing.
It’s acknowledging that tomorrow the race heads into the Pyrenees and then to the Alps, and Pogačar and Vingegaard will become the spectacle and focus once again, but the triumph of Abrahamsen and Uno-X is today’s story, a day reserved for the smaller, pluckier, aggressive teams where panache and belief is everything.
It’s finally achieving a long-held dream. “I’ve been working so hard for this in the last three years, this breakaway project,” he said. “Today I got in the break and then I finally got my stage win.”
It’s the post-race celebration at the team’s bus, and their entire staff rejoicing in the fact that they, a team who have only competed in three Grand Tours, have just won a stage of the biggest bike race in the world. “It’s amazing, unbelievable. This was our goal and now we’ve reached our goal,” sports director Christian Andersen beamed. “Jonas is an absolute wonderboy.”
This, Jonas Abrahamsen winning stage 11, four weeks after breaking his collarbone is what the Tour de France is.
