
Jonas Vingegaard is happy to have the yellow jersey on his shoulders, but he is also convinced that today's race, after the stop caused by bad weather 44 kilometers from the finish, should not have restarted. Slippery roads and cold characterized the final part of the fourth stage of Paris-Nice, and this did not please Vingegaard, who challenged the jury and organizers' decision.
"Of course I'm happy to wear the yellow jersey. That's not the problem," the Dane said after the race. "But simply, we should not have been here. We should not have raced."
44 kilometers from the finish line, the race was neutralized due to bad weather and slippery roads, after a breakaway group had accumulated a good advantage.
With the neutralization, the riders remained stationary for a while, and Jonas Vingegaard and others waited in their team cars to avoid getting cold.
After about ten minutes of waiting, cyclists were allowed to restart, arriving at the end of a long descent, where sections of road with frozen snow were evident. The riders regrouped 28.8 kilometers from the finish and were made to restart at the time intervals prior to the neutralization.
"It's hard to explain what happened. But they let us pedal for 12 kilometers downhill, where we froze, could barely brake, and risked crashing because we couldn't touch the brakes. In my opinion, the race should not have restarted."
Vingegaard finished second behind Almeida and now wears the yellow jersey that this morning was on teammate Jorgenson's shoulders.
"The problem is that we suffered from the cold just as much as before. No matter how many clothes you wear, it's almost impossible to stay warm in those moments. Even if you've been pedaling for an hour, you can't regain body heat. I think as riders we should have united more today and said it no longer made sense for us to continue the race."
Not only the riders but also the organizers did not expect such a significant weather deterioration. But in the end, a race stop was inevitable, and therefore the riders were exposed to the elements for too long.
"None of us expected the weather to worsen like today. Suddenly it started hailing, the roads were very slippery, and there were also lightning. I think they should have just stopped us, especially when there are lightning strikes. Everyone knows that racing in such weather is too dangerous."