The Col de la Loze was not a nice place to be on Thursday afternoon. Not because it is 26.5km long at 6.4%, or even because it was being raced as stage 18 of the Tour de France, but because it was cold, wet and miserable.
There was freezing rain, hail and low cloud to boot, not that the men dressed as lobsters were put off by the conditions, but it was noticeably horrid.
In these grim conditions, perhaps it isn’t a surprise that a man from the Scottish Borders performed so well. Oscar Onley came into Thursday in fourth, two minutes behind Florian Lipowitz in third, and just 38 seconds ahead of Primož Roglič in fifth, the Picnic PostNL filling in a Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe sandwich. A difficult place to be.
Part way through stage 18, it looked even more difficult, with both Lipowitz and Roglič up the road, and Onley in danger of falling to fifth. Even at the foot of the Col de la Loze, Lipowitz had two minutes on the group, and could have cemented his place in third.
How different things looked 20km later, with Onley the ‘best of the rest’ general classification rider behind Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard. The Briton stuck with the pair until the final kilometre, coming in four seconds behind the latter, and gaining time on both Lipowitz and Roglič. With just one mountain stage remaining, Onley is now 22 seconds off the podium, and the white jersey too, which Lipowitz currently holds. That Red Bull sandwich is now looking a bit more appetising.
“Um, yeah, it was hard,” Onley told ITV Sport at the top of the mountain, looking distinctly tired, barely able to speak, understandable given he had just climbed over 5,500m in one day. “It was… I don’t even know. Visma just set a hard pace and I just did what I could.”
The Scot had been put into the red on the second of three hors categories climbs on Thursday, the Col de la Madeleine, but a huge effort by his team-mates Warren Barguil and Frank van den Broek brought him back into the action, setting Onley up for his dream finish.
The latest race content, interviews, features, reviews and expert buying guides, direct to your inbox!
“I wouldn’t say I kept my cool [on Madeleine],” he continued. “I still felt good, I’m just not at the level of those guys when they attack and it showed at the end that they went pretty hard up there.”
“The team was really good,” Onley added, perhaps an understatement.
Asked if he was excited to be so close to the podium, he said: “Yeah. I don’t know. That’s not much so we’ll give it everything tomorrow.”
His Picnic PostNL team-mate Sean Flynn had said earlier in the week: “Sometimes, I feel like the rest of us are happier than he even is. He’s just very focused and he knows what he needs to do.”
Less than half an hour after the finish and his interview, Onley had cycled 6km back down the mountain and climbed on the bus, looking pretty wet. Day ticked off.
“I’m really happy with how the boys performed today,” his sports director Matt Winston said, more able to complete his sentences. “[It was a] hard stage. Oscar couldn’t follow the moves on the Madeleine and had to pace himself a little bit there. Unfortunately, he was with quite some riders, but no one wanted to ride with him, so over the top and after the descent, we decided we’d wait in the valley for Warren and Frank to come back to then bring him back to the peloton, which they did in a really good way and then were able to set him up for the final climb where everything could turn on its head.
“I think he was really on top of his nutrition today and that kept him in really good light ready for that final climb,” he continued. “What a fantastic ride from him there on the final, finishing fourth on the stage and 25 seconds [sic] off the podium.”
Fourth for Onley was already impressive enough, but a podium place and the white jersey would be something else, a level that many thought wouldn’t come for another couple of years at least.
He might not sound or look ecstatic, but Onley is on for something special at this Tour de France, and he has survived the rain and hail in the Alps for one day out of two. It’s simply La Plagne to come on Friday, 19.3km at 7.2% this time, perhaps in the rain again. The weather is nothing the man from Kelso hasn’t faced before, but the Tour de France podium is something else.
