Tour de France stage 13 reactions: Jakob Fuglsang, Geraint Thomas, Nairo Quintana, Steven Kruijswijk
Jul 20 2019 05:41 am CET
Tour de France
The individual time trial of the 2019 Tour de France was won by Julian Alaphilippe and caused some changes in the General Classification standing. Jakob Fuglsang, Geraint Thomas, Nairo Quintana and Steven Kruijswijk shared their views on the day and the stages to come.
Jakob Fuglsang (Astana)
"In the end, I hoped that I wouldn’t lose that much time, but on the other hand, I’m still happy with my performance and the feeling I had on the bike today. I did gain a bit of time on some GC contenders, so I think it’s still going in the right direction. I think I have to be satisfied with today. The power was good, so I can’t complain about my performance this time trial. Now I’m looking forward to the next days. Starting with tomorrow, which will be a special stage because it’s a short and intense stage right after today’s time trial. I think we’ll see that the Tour opens up tomorrow for the first time. I’m curious and I’m looking forward to it."
Geraint Thomas (Ineos)
"It wasn’t too bad it just felt like I was just overheating a bit so I was trying to deal with that. It’s not an excuse it’s the same for everyone. It was okay – just in that last bit, I didn’t really feel it. It was controlled, but in the last 8km or so I felt like when I really wanted to step on it I didn’t quite have that last five per cent. It’s still a decent ride but you always pick it apart a bit. [Alaphilippe] is obviously going really well. He’s certainly the favourite and the one to watch at the minute. There’s a long way to go and a lot of hard stages to come now."
Nairo Quintana (Movistar)
"My legs felt fine during the TT. Let’s hope it’s the same for the mountains, so we can perform well. We lost some time today, yet I felt OK. The final section was really flat, which meant the big rouleurs could push harder and gain more speed than us climbers. Now it’s time to attack – the mountains come, it’s our terrain."
Steven Kruijswijk (Jumbo Visma)
"After Wout’s crash, I had to quickly change my focus. It is unfortunate that it happened. You don’t want it to happen to anyone. I think I did a great time trial myself. The course was ideal for me and the feeling was pretty good. I knew that the first part suited me best with all those short, tough climbs. The last part was a lot less steep. It went very well until the second intermediate point. I expected to give in some time at the end. The time differences are still very small and I expect that the remainder of the Tour will be exciting. For now, I am third overall and doing well."
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