2023-07-15 21:39:48
Between two colossi, Carlos Rodríguez (Ineos). The quiet man launched into a descent of fury and fire, the kind the ancients called an open grave. He came out of the first corner of the Joux Plane with his left foot brushing the parapet and entered Morzine, turning his head to avoid a utility pole on the last turn of the downhill. The calm man is a competitive beast. The quiet man isn’t John Wayne, it’s Maureen O’Hara smacking him with an open hand. Carlos Rodríguez, 22, confirms that he is a winner. And the most important thing was perhaps not the victory.
The most important thing was the way to achieve it, which is what distinguishes the good from the best. It was a triumph in style. Carlos Rodríguez went to win the day that Pogacar (UAE) and Vingegaard (Jumbo) chose to tell the four winds that their place in the history of the Tour is at the table of the greatest, that their duel inaugurates a legendary era and that the public can be sure that they are witnessing live an epic that does not pale before any. That Pogacar wants to be Merckx and even the ‘Cannibal’ admits why not. And that Vingegaard disputes his hegemony over a giant of that stature, which gives an idea of his dimension. That was settled on the ascent ramps to the Joux Plane. The Slovenian attacked and opened a few meters. After an iron heads-up, the Dane closed the gap before the top. No one could be in that duel of the titans, but Carlos Rodríguez was watching closely.
When after the top – where Vingegaard surprised Pogacar and took away his bonus – they slowed down, the Andalusian and Adam Yates (UAE) came back. A feat for a 22-year-old boy who took his suitcase and left his house in Almuñécar at the age of 16 and has not yet returned. He has not returned, but he has seen the world and has always raced against the best. And he has known the competition. And that is why he was not satisfied with his feat and knew that it was time to attack.
It’s not just winning, it’s how you win. That is what always caught the attention of Carlos Rodríguez, what filled the notebooks of all the coaches who combed the top-level junior calendar throughout Europe. This boy has something, was the consensus. That so difficult to explain and that comes to be called class. That timing. Which is not exactly the time, nor the rhythm, nor the movement. It’s something more to do with style than physics. It is the simple but lethal gesture in the first corner of the descent. The descent of the Joux Plane is scary, a narrow road, neither open nor closed curves that make you doubt whether to brake or not and an inclination that throws the bike at too much speed. And Rodríguez who kept his pulse until the end against a Pogacar who wanted the ten bonus seconds and only raised his arms after crossing the finish line.
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He smiles and goes back to being the calm man. The incandescent volcano goes out as soon as you cross the line, with a gesture of absolute calm and no trace of the competitive fury that has led him to win the stage and place third overall. Face of being cool as a salad. The Tour, which crushes almost everyone, does not weigh on him.
In Movistar they rub their hands
And at Movistar they rub their hands. At 22 years, five months and 13 days, he is the youngest Spaniard to win a Tour stage. With his leader, Enric Mas, at home from the first stage and one of the three lowest budgets on the World Tour, a cyclist of the future will wear his jersey for the next two years.
Carlos Rodríguez would have run in the Reynolds. Tall, 1.83 tall, and strong. Understated, nothing fancy. Exquisite in the manifestations of him, Engineering student. Long-distance runner, laps in stages. The Vitruvian Man by José Miguel Echavarri. The ideal cyclist for the Navarrese coach, in love with Italy and Pinarello bikes like the one the young Andalusian rides. Patxi Vila prepares the landing strip for his flashy signing and Spanish cycling dreams of the perfect rivalry between the discreet and serious Rodríguez and the expansive Juan Ayuso (UAE), a year younger and so many times companions in those worlds of fatigue. god in youth racing together with Igor Arrieta (Kern Pharma).
The victory in Morzine changes the consideration of Carlos Rodríguez, who was considered a cyclist marked by solidity. Diesel. This Saturday his winning facet was discovered, the one that everyone who knew him highlighted every time he asked them. He has more registers than to put up with the big rhythms. He now he is third. Last year he made his debut in the Vuelta a España and was seventh despite a tremendous fall. Yesterday he rose between two colossi in full expression of his faculties. He won, but the most important thing was how he did it. With that thing so difficult to describe called class.
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