Tadej Pogacar’s bid for a fifth Tour de France title could come under threat with a sickness bug seemingly sweeping through his UAE Team Emirates XRG teammates.
Pogacar holds a commanding lead of nearly five minutes over his rivals and appeared all but certain to wrap up another yellow jersey after dominating the race virtually from the outset.
But Thursday’s Stage 18 to Orcieres-Merlette perhaps provoked reason for concern for the great Slovenian with UAE neither as forceful or prominent as usual in the mountains.
Brandon McNulty, who started the day feeling a sore throat, was forced to abandon the race midway through the stage, while another key lieutenant in Adam Yates battled through again having struggled himself with illness this week.
While Isaac del Toro was able to stay with his team leader, the Mexican has also slipped back from Remco Evenepoel in the chase for second place behind Pogacar – and the race leader himself fuelled speculation over his condition by swapping his usual yellow shorts for a black pair.
There are two potentially defining mountain tests to come as the peloton takes on Alpe d’Huez on back-to-back stages, before the final stage around Paris on Sunday.
“I’m sad that Brandon could not finish,” Pogacar admitted to The Guardian after protecting his lead to the finish in Orcieres-Merlette. “We will see in the next two days but Adam is getting better, and tomorrow, we will go with the flow.
“I think we can manage. It’s the third week, all the teams are suffering. There are bodies everywhere on a stage like today. We will keep fighting and I believe we can do it.”
Key UAE domestiques Tim Wellens and Florian Vermeersch have also been apparently dealing with illness as the Tour nears its conclusion.
It leaves greater importance placed upon the hardy Nils Pollitt and Felix Grossschartner to guide Pogacar and Del Toro through the next three days as UAE look to secure a race one-two after the abandonment of Jonas Vingegaard following a heavy crash.
“Thank goodness Isaac and Tadej are feeling good, and so are Felix and I,” Politt said.
“We are trying to separate ourselves from the team as much as possible in order to simply minimise the risk. Many riders are ill in the bunch – you hear from every team that there’s something going around. That is simply part of three weeks. I’ve never got to the end of a Tour without sick hands.”
Stage 19 is a 127.9km route from Gap to the summit of Alpe d’Huez, with the final climb set to test the riders across 13.8km at an average gradient of eight per cent.
The peloton will also finish on the iconic ascent on Saturday on a huge day in the mountains that also features the Col du Galibier, the highest peak in this year’s race.
