Jonas Vingegaard has ‘little way to go’ before Eddy Merckx comparisons – Robbie McEwen on Tour de France champ

Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo-Visma) has a “little way to go” before comparisons to the likes of Eddy Merckx can be made, said Robbie McEwen, who added that the Dane “doesn’t look like stopping anytime soon” after securing a second Tour de France title.

Vingegaard now joins a small club of riders to win the Tour twice, including Pogacar, although needs three more to match the exploits of Merckx, Jacques Anquetil, Miguel Indurain and Bernard Hinault.

“There’s not a lot of riders that do it back-to-back, I mean there are other riders who have won two Tours,” 12-time Tour stage winner McEwen said on The Breakaway in Paris.

“You’ve got a little way to go before you start comparing him to the likes of Eddy Merckx, Jacques Anquetil, Bernard Hinault, Chris Froome… If he can keep this up, he doesn’t look like stopping anytime soon.”

He added: “We saw the beginning of the Vingegaard era last year with his win. He had a few moments where we thought maybe Pogacar was getting the better of him but he bounced back every single time. When it came to the crunch, the really big moments, he shone.”

He can expect to renew his rivalry with Pogacar, who now faces the dilemma of whether to park his Spring Classics ambitions to arrive at the Tour in top shape next year.

Pogacar claimed victory at a spree of one-day races in a sensational start to the season, including the Tour of Flanders and Amstel Gold, before his build-up to the Tour was derailed when he fractured his wrist at Liege-Bastogne-Liege.

Asked if he could see Vingegaard winning the Tour again, Adam Blythe said: “100%. He’s the type of rider that can do that. But there’s always someone new coming up.

“As he’s going now, his trajectory is saying ‘yes, he definitely can’. But Pogacar has been focused on a lot of other things this year, if he focused on the Tour de France it might be a different story.”

He added: “Jonas is a Tour de France rider. I’m not going to say it’s the only race he’s good at, but he has one target through the year. Every little bit of detail throughout the year will be towards the Tour de France.

“You look at Tadej Pogacar, he’s like jack of all trades – attacking on the Champs-Elysees, wanting to win Flanders, Liege, Amstel…

“If you go through that process and get into the third week, the hardest week of the Tour de France where everyone starts to break, it’s always where Jonas steps up and comes to his strongest.

“For UAE and Pogacar, taking the Classics away from him next year would be the hardest thing.”