Groenewegen Takes Sprint Win in 2019 Tour de France Stage 7

Kevin Curry

Jul 12, 2019 — 2 min read

The Tour’s longest stage was held today and it was decided by a few hair widths. Dylan Groenewegen won today’s 230 kilometer (143 mile) stage 7 just ahead of Caleb Ewan after an uphill sprint in Chalon-sur-SaÃ´ne.

It’s Groenewegen’s first stage win at the 2019 Tour de France and his fourth career stage victory. It’s good to see Groenewegen back in the mix after he sat out the Tour’s first two sprint stages as he healed up from a hard crash on stage 1.

“The first day I crashed really hard but yesterday I feel really good, and today my team works hard for me and I take the win,” Groenewegen said.

Groenewegen was boxed in the peloton with about 500m to the finish. Deceuninck-Quick Step took control of the peloton just inside the final kilometer, with Yves Lampaert doing most of the work. As Lampaert pulled off, Michael Morkov and then Max Richeze took turns with Elia Viviani tucked into the slipstream ready to pounce.

Groenewegen was three wheels behind Viviani as the finish came into sight.

“It was a small final with some hectic corners, and we were boxed in with 500 meters,” Groenewegen said.

As the sprint got ready to launch, Groenewegen jumped to the left-hand side of the road and blew past Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) and Viviani. On the right-hand side of the group, Ewan did the same.

https://twitter.com/johnlelangue/status/1149717322418085888

Photo replay showed Groenewegen edging out Ewan by a very slim margin.