Tour de France: Dominant Slovenian stars, COVID concerns will test field
Primoz Roglic and Tadej Pogacar are the main rivals for the Tour de France. The three-week race starts in Denmark on Friday and ends in Paris on July 24. Pogachar won Tirreno-Adriatico and the UAE Tour this year. Rogic won the Criterium du Dauphine stage race this month. His Jumbo-Visma teammate Jonas Vingegaard is a co-leader. Wout van Aert is nursing a sore kneecap. Ben O'Connor finished fourth in the 2021 Tour. He is also a threat.
The Tour de France starts from Paris-Roubaix on July 24. The race features the return of Paris’s cobblestones and six mountain stages with five summit finishes. There is a second stage for sprinters, 125 miles from Roskilde to Nyborg in central Denmark. Annemiek van Vleuten of Movistar team will be among the contenders in the women”s Tour. The penultimate stage is an exciting 25-mile time trial to the clifftop village of Rocamadour in south-central France.
Matti Trentin has tested positive for COVID-19 and he's replaced by Marc Hirschi. Bryan Coquard and Daryl Impey will miss the race after testing positive. Florian Senechal takes over Mark Cavendish's sprinting slot. Bahrain Victorious team was raided by police for the second time this week on Thursday. The Bahrain team is preparing for Tour de France. It's the first time since the team has been involved in cycling.
