u/CEOofCoitus

[Giacomo] Notari assures us that he will recommend the race to the team management. “I will do so. We decided to come here with young riders, to start developing them, because it’s a long stage race and that could be good for them in the future. Perhaps that’s why we struggled a bit on the toughest stages, because it’s difficult for young riders to tackle long stages in a gruelling race. But I think we’ll be back. It was a good test and a good experience,” he said.

The GNR now knows where the driver of the van that fatally struck British cyclist Finlay Tarling during the eighth stage of the Volta a Portugal came from, TVI – part of the same group as CNN Portugal – has learnt.

The 56-year-old man entered the race circuit 800 metres from the scene of the accident via a secondary road that was not closed; there were no barrier tapes or GNR officers preventing access.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

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Superman may be Slovenian, but Iron Man… is ours! The Portuguese cyclist Nelson Oliveira has just crossed the finish line of the final stage of the Tour and made history in world cycling: he has become the first rider to complete 24 Grand Tours in a row without ever withdrawing.

The cyclist, born 37 years ago in Anadia, has left behind Sylvester Szmyd, the Polish rider who had equalled the record at this year’s Giro. He now stands alone with 501 consecutive stages completed, spread across 10 Tours de France, 10 Vuelta a España and 4 Giro d’Italia – a total of 72,658.2 kilometres!

To get a sense of the sheer scale of this achievement, here are some ‘real-life’ comparisons:

- travelling round the world along the equator is 40,000 km; Nelson is about to complete his second lap.

- we are 384,400 km from the Moon; Nelson has already covered 19 per cent of that distance.

- The journey between Lisbon and Porto is around 315 km; Nelson has already covered that distance 231 times.

He made his Grand Tour debut in 2011 at the Vuelta, and hasn’t looked back since. It was in Spain that he achieved the greatest victory of his career, winning the 13th stage of the 2015 edition, when he also secured his best overall finish – 21st.

In this final stage of the 113th edition of the Tour, Nelson Oliveira was consistently well-positioned and finished 21st, 8 seconds behind Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin). He ends the race in 65th place overall, 4 hours, 17 minutes and 56 seconds behind Pogacar.

He began his professional career with Xacobeo-Galicia in 2010, moving to the World Tour the following year via Radioshack, where he spent three years. He then transferred to Lampre, where he acted as Rui Costa’s lead-out man for two seasons. Since 2016, he has been riding for Movistar, the team with which he has renewed his contract for a further two seasons.

Overall, only the Italian Matteo Tosatto has completed more Grand Tours than the Portuguese rider: he has finished 28 of the 34 he has started.