'It's been a long journey': Vingegaard wins Tour de France for 2nd consecutive year

Danish rider Jonas Vingegaard won the Tour de France for a second straight year as cycling's most storied race finished Sunday on the famed Champs-Elysees.

With a huge lead built up over main rival Tadej Pogacar, the 2020 and 2021 winner, Vingegaard knew the victory was effectively his again before the largely ceremonial stage at the end of the 110th edition of the Tour.

The 26-year-old Vingegaard drank champagne with his Jumbo-Visma teammates as they lined up together and posed for photos on the way to Paris.

"It's been a long journey, yet it went by so fast," Vingegaard said. "Day after day, it was a super hard race with a super nice fight between me and Tadej. I've enjoyed every day. I hope to come back next year and see if I can take a third win."

It had been a three-week slog over 3,405 kilometres with eight mountain stages across five mountain ranges. Vingegaard seized control of the race over two stages in the Alps.

Little had separated the two rivals until Vingegaard finished a time trial one minute 38 seconds ahead of Pogacar on Tuesday, then followed up the next day by finishing the toughest mountain stage of the race almost six minutes ahead of his exhausted rival.

"I'm dead," Pogacar said.

The Slovenian rider responded by winning the penultimate stage on Saturday, but Vingegaard still had an insurmountable lead of seven minutes 29 seconds going into the final stage, a mostly ceremonial stage which is contested at the end by the sprinters.

"We have to be careful not to do anything stupid," Vingegaard warned Saturday, "but yeah, it's amazing to take my second victory in the Tour de France."

Vingegaard kept that lead and was able to celebrate early Sunday as organizers decided to take the times one lap before