The 28-year-old Dane came back from injury to take a season-ending victory in Saitama despite a mid-race crash.
JAPAN:
Former Tour de France champion Jonas Vingegaard said he was finally back to his best after last year’s horror crash after ending his season on Sunday with victory at Japan’s Saitama Criterium.
The Dane was the two-time defending Tour de France champion when a high-speed fall at the Tour of the Basque Country last April left him hospitalized with a punctured lung and several broken bones.
The accident shook him mentally and physically but he started picking up the pieces this year.
The 28-year-old finished second in the Tour de France before claiming a third career Grand Tour victory at the Vuelta a Espana in September.
Wingegaard ended his season with another win in Saitama and said his return to the top had taken “a bit longer than I thought”.
“You never really know when you have a bad crash like that if you’re going to get back to the same level you were before,” he said.
“Only at the end of this year can I see that I can push in the same way I was before my crash.”
Vingegaard missed last year’s Paris Olympics and finished well behind rival Tadej Pogacar at the Tour de France in the months after his crash.
He said he hoped he had put the accident behind him as he looked ahead to next season.
“It took me a long time to get back to the same level,” he said.
“You slowly get back into it and hopefully now I can go back to improving rather than trying to get back to the same level.”
Back on the bike
Vingegaard powered home on the final lap to win the Saitama Criterium ahead of Italy’s Jonathan Milan and Australia’s Kaden Groves.
He had to do it the hard way after crashing three-quarters of the way through the 60km course, before getting back on his bike and continuing the race.
“Luckily I didn’t hurt myself and I just slipped,” said Vingegaard, who was helped back to his bike by Team UAE’s Davide Stella.
“I just lost the wheel and luckily nothing happened and then I was able to come back and win.”
Vingegaard was side by side with Slovenian Primoz Roglic before making his final attack on the final lap of the track.
The Dane said his fall disrupted his race plan, but he was able to think on his feet and stay in contention.
“At first you’re just thinking about getting back in the pack,” he said.
“Then there was an attack I could follow and luckily I could go solo from there.”
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