Wout van Aert (Jumbo-Visma) is currently on track for the best year of his career after taking out stage eight of this year's Tour de France.
Winning moment Stage 8: Tour de France 2022
The stage win was the second of the Tour for the Belgian rider, with his stage four victory also elevating him to his current standing at the top of the points classification - 115 points ahead of Dutch competitor Fabio Jakobsen (Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl).
The 27-year-old has already claimed green jersey honours at both the Paris-Nice in March and the Tour-warm-up Critérium du Dauphiné in mid-June, meaning that success in the points classification at this year's Tour will be van Aert's third green jersey win of the calendar year.
The Belgian's incredible stage victory overnight proved just why 2022 has been his most decorated year in cycling to date, as he managed to accelerate past Aussie Michael Matthews on a tricky final climb in Lausanne to claim the win - also ahead of yellow jersey leader Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) in third.
“I’m super happy,” van Aert said. “Today was a big chance to take a lot of points from my competitors. My team put everything in it to chase down the breakaway and then you have to finish it off.”
“It was a pretty tough climb - 4.5km at 4.5% with the flat part in between, so when it was going uphill it was really steep so I had to fight to stay in the wheel. I had to fight to stay on the wheel of Pogačar, but I knew if I could stay on the wheel, I knew the finish was a little flatter, and I could do my sprint.
“I didn’t think about it (winning at the venue of the Lausanne Olympics) but winning anywhere in the Tour de France is nice.”
The victory was reminiscent of van Aert's success on stage four when the green machine launched an explosive final attack to finish eight seconds ahead of the bunch finish - the icing on the cake to a dream start to the 2022 Tour.
The climb-heavy Aigle to Châtel route on Sunday (AEST) will be another test of van Aert's ability to keep his considerable lead at the top of the green jersey standings, but the Belgian will undoubtedly be eyeing off a big finish up on Châtel Les Portes du Soleil with a rest day on Monday (AEST) to look forward to.
The Tour de France continues with Stage 9, a tough day in the mountains from Aigle to Châtel les Portes du Soleil. Watch the racing action on the SBS SKODA Tour Tracker from 8:20pm (AEST), with the SBS broadcast and SBS On Demand live stream beginning at 8:30pm.
