2023-07-04 18:18:24
The Belgian sprinter from Alpecin-Deceuninck won a new stage on the Nogaro circuit on Tuesday July 4 after having already raised his arms on Monday. The end was marked by several falls.
And two! Jasper Philipsen was once again the fastest, this Tuesday July 4, to win the 4th stage of the Tour de France 2023, in Nogaro. Like the day before in Bayonne, the Belgian sprinter from Alpecin-Deceuninck benefited from a luxury launch from his teammate Mathieu van der Poel. Once placed in orbit, no one was able to take it back, even if the Australian Caleb Ewan (Lotto-Dstny) finished by a hair’s breadth. He shares the podium with the German Phil Bauhaus (Bahrain-Victorious), already on the box on Monday. These three appear to be the fastest in the peloton, but Philipsen is their king and he endorses the green jersey in passing. The last time a rider had slammed two victorious sprints in a row on the Tour was in 2018 and the work of Dylan Groenewegen (14th today).
The arrival at Nogaro was disputed on a motor racing circuit, the Paul Armagnac track. An unusual setting, willingly telegenic but where the peloton seems to have lost its bearings and which has seen an increase in falls. Dutchman Fabio Jakobsen (Quickstep-Soudal) fell first, even before the red flame. Then it was Matej Mohoric (Bahrain-Victorious), Quinn Simmons (Trek-Lidl), Mikkel Bjerg (UAE Team Emirates) or Søren Wærenskjold (Uno-X) who were thrown to the ground. No favorite in the general classification however had bad luck and the yellow jersey remains on the shoulders of Adam Yates.
We had to wait halfway through the stage for something to happen. For the first 90 kilometres, the peloton shuffled along at the pace of a procession, seeming to do everything to avoid waking the dozing viewer. Not an escape to get your teeth into, nothing. Then the riders approached Notre-Dame des Cyclistes, a place consecrated in 1959 by a bike-mad priest, where the only intermediate sprint of the day was contested. It is more surely his thighs than a healthy mind that allowed Jasper Philipsen to outstrip his competitors. In the process, the Manchois Benoît Cosnefroy (AG2R-Citroën) and Anthony Delaplace (Arkéa-Samsic) decided to bring the race out of its torpor and take the tangent. An enterprise obviously doomed to failure, as the stage was so flat, but which will have had the merit of helping to wait before the final circuit.
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