• Classifications This is the Tour

  • Van Aert "He is the best cyclist in the world"

Jasper Philipsen put the climax on the Champs-Elysées to the 2022 Tour de France, which crowned Jonas Vingegaard in one of the most exciting, disputed and fun editions, the 109th, in memory.

That of the triumph of offensive cycling, the fastest in all history, the one that, for the second consecutive year, did not see the triumph of any Spanish or Italian, that of the stratospheric differences between the first two and the rest.

The second Dane to win a Tour (after Bjarne Riis in 1996) he completed the 3,349.8 kilometers that separated Copenhagen from Paris in more than 42 kilometers per hour.

It never went that fast, only the first week it was shot above 45 per hour and Van Aert, who did not even try to repeat his victory in Paris on Sunday, covered the 40 kilometers of the last Rocamadour time trial at 50.9.

The aerodynamics, the permanent strength and the improvement of the runners explain the rush that, in addition, erases an ugly precedent forever.

In 2005, the third Tour of Lance Armstrong (all were taken from him because of doping), he went to 41,654.

You also have to go back a long way to see such wide differences in time between the first two, clear dominators, and the third.

The veteran Geraint Thomas stepped on the podium with more than eight minutes lost on the leader, as in 2002 (again Armstrong), Raimondas Rumsas.

Laurant Madouas, 11th, lost almost 37 minutes.

By the way, only Indurain had managed to win a Tour that left his own country (in 1992 he left from San Sebastián, next year he will do it from Bilbao), French aside, of course.

A Tour of records and new dynamics, as the globalization that conquered the world of cycling is confirmed.

Christophe Laporte avoided almost in extremis the never seen before, that no French, Italian or Spanish won a stage.

Even so, the crisis of three of the most classic countries is evident.

Again without a local on the podium (Gaudu was fourth and the count of years without Gallic winners continues to increase, since Bernard Hinault in 1985), nor any Italian or Spanish in the top 10.

They both ran out of stages: Matteo Trentin in 2019 was the last transalpine and Omar Fraile in 2018 the distant last national.

It was the 50th time that the Tour had come to an end on the Champs-Élysées and it was the 12th victory there for a Belgian, the second on the Tour for Philipsen after Carcassonne, faster than Groenewegen and Kristoff.

Germans Max Schachmann and Jonas Rutsch were the last to resist from a bigger breakaway, but were caught with seven kilometers to go, with just one lap to go.

So there, playfully, Geraint Thonas and Filippo Ganna moved on one side and Tadej Pogacar on the other, pure spectacle until the very end.

Conforms to The Trust Project criteria

Know more

  • Bilbao

  • Paris