Bob Jungels Wins 9th Stage of Tour de France

On Sunday 10 July 2022, Luxembourg's Bob Jungels won stage nine of the 2022 Tour de France cycle race, from Aigle to the Portes du Soleil ski station in Chatel in the French Alps, close to Morzine.

The 193-km stage 9, set almost exclusively in Switzerland, saw the 29 year-old Luxembourg road cyclist leave the pelethon  on a solo break with 64km to go, on what was the penultimate categorised climb of the stage. His breakaway came on the descent of the Col de la Croix where he reached almost 100km an hour.

He held off a spirited late attack by Thibaut Pinot (who closed the 2-minutes gap to around 20 seconds at one stage) to finish in 4 hours 46 minutes 39 seconds, just 22 seconds ahead of J. Castroviejo of Spain, to earn his first career Tour stage.

Jungels, who rides for the AG2R Citroen team, rose from 24th to 16th in the general classification, with Slovenia's Tadej Pogacar (racing for UAE Team Emirates) still in front (Jungels is 5 mins 53 secs in arrears).

He almost did not make the start of this year's Tour de France, having tested positive for COVID-19 in the week before the Tour began; he was only allowed compete after doctors deemed that he was not contagious to others.

Jungels became the 16th Luxembourg cyclist to win a stage on the Tour de France. The previous Luxembourg stage win was by Andy Schleck in 2011 on the Col du Galibier (Frank Schleck was second in that stage).

Luxembourg’s Minister for Sports, Georges Engles, sent Bob Jungels a message of congratulations on Sunday evening. “Congratulations Bob! After an extraordinary ride, you did a great number today at the Tour de France by winning this 9th stage of the Grande Boucle alone. A hell of a number, Bob! Good luck for the future.”

Today, Monday, is a rest day; Tuesday sees the first of three successive mountain stage days in the Alps.