If you wanted a quiet, predictable day of racing, Stage 4 of Paris-Nice was absolutely not for you. What was supposed to be a standard transition into the hills devolved into complete chaos almost immediately after leaving Bourges. Crosswinds shredded the peloton, crashes eliminated the race leader, and Jonas Vingegaard ultimately rode away from everyone while wearing his bib shorts on the outside of his jersey.
Yes, you read that right. We’ll get to the fashion choices in a moment.
The Carnage Before the Climbs
The script for this stage was completely ripped up at kilometer zero. Brutal crosswinds instantly split the race into echelons, leaving a terrified 40-rider lead group hammering away at the front. Visma | Lease a Bike’s PR machine predictably called it a “heroic” team performance after the stage, but the reality is they were caught napping. Vingegaard was isolated early, with only Edoardo Affini there to babysit him while the rest of the yellow-and-black armada missed the split entirely.
Then came the disaster. With roughly 40 kilometers to go, a massive crash tore through the lead group on a wet corner. The victim? Race leader Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek), who was forced to abandon the race in pain, completely upending the General Classification battle in the blink of an eye.
A Four-on-One Red Bull Ambush That Completely Failed
The crash fractured the lead group again, leaving Vingegaard completely isolated at the front. The only company he had? Four riders from Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe.
Tactically, this is the exact nightmare scenario teams spend their entire winter training camps trying to avoid. But when you are Jonas Vingegaard, conventional cycling tactics are apparently just suggestions. The Red Bull squad—led by Tim and Mick van Dijke—paced the group to the base of the final climb at the Signal d’Uchon. They had the numbers, they had the strategy, and they had absolutely no answer when Vingegaard casually decided the race was over.
Under the one-kilometer banner, hitting gradients that spiked to 16 percent, the Dane simply rode away. Daniel Felipe Martinez tried to follow, but it was a lost cause. Vingegaard crested the summit solo, putting 41 seconds into Martinez to take his first win of the season and easily slide into the yellow jersey.
The Birth of a Horrifying New Trend
But the most remarkable part of Vingegaard’s solo demolition wasn’t the wattage, it was the outfit.
Because the racing was completely full-gas from the very first pedal stroke in freezing rain, Vingegaard never had the chance to strip off his extreme cold-weather gear. He tackled the decisive climb with his heavy winter bib tights pulled up completely over his Visma-Lease a Bike jersey.
“Maybe you can call me a trendsetter with the long pants, but there was just no time to take it off,” Vingegaard joked after the finish, completely unbothered by the fact that he looked like a chaotic commuter who got dressed in the dark. It was the least aerodynamic setup imaginable, which only makes the fact that he dropped four guys from a rival team even more humiliating for everyone else involved.
Visma’s sports director Marc Reef noted that the team “will do everything we can to defend the jersey” over the coming days. If Vingegaard keeps riding like this, they probably won’t even need to help him.
Results
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