The improvised Vuelta a España podium after this year’s race was inspired by Tom Pidcock‘s mum, Jonas Vingegaard revealed this week.
Speaking at a presentation at Visma-Lease a Bike‘s headquarters, the Dane said that the moment was one of the “best moments of his career”, according to Dutch outlet Wielerflits.
“I think the idea came from Tom Pidcock’s mum,” Vingegaard said, according to Domestique. “And then they grabbed it and said: ‘Okay, then we arrange it.’ They were in different hotels, and then they all came to our hotel, like schoolboys. We had to keep it a bit of a secret, otherwise the protestors would come. And also Matthew [Riccitello from Israel-Premier Tech] had to get the white jersey, of course, so I guess we had to keep it a bit of a secret.
“I was just very disappointed that we couldn’t go to Madrid and do the celebration there,” he continued. “But actually it was a super nice way of celebrating it. It was way smaller and way more intimate in some kind of ways. So it was really a nice celebration. Actually it was a lot nicer than I thought it would be.
“It shows that in cycling we can actually stand together and get something like: ‘Okay, we want to do something together.’ And maybe not only there, but actually in the whole race with all these protests, for once as riders and teams we were standing more together, which we haven’t been able to do in recent years.”
“It’s very easy to do a protest and stand on the road there,” he said. “This is not the first time it has happened, though. But now it seemed like they realised, especially after the Bilbao stage, how vulnerable cycling is. They can really get into the media when they stop the race. I just hope the UCI or the organisers can do something about it, and that it won’t be a major problem in the future.
“I guess I just realised that cycling is not everything. Even if I don’t win, the world is still turning and there’s still a day tomorrow. Before this, I thought about it too much. I got really nervous a lot, but then I just worked my way through it. Now I’m even more relaxed than I’ve ever been. Before the Bola del Mundo [on stage 20, which he won] I realised if I do my best, I cannot do any more than that.”
“Of course there’s still the Tour de France,” he said. “The Tour is the Tour. It’s a very special race. I still dream of winning the Tour again. I would be lying if I said otherwise. And all these one-week stage races on the WorldTour, like the ones I haven’t won yet, those are also races that I kind of dream of winning.”
