(Reuters) – The Professional Cyclists’ Association (CPA) said it will take legal action against a spectator who threw potato chips at UAE Team Emirates’ Tadej Pogacar and Visma-Lease A Bike’s Jonas Vingegaard during the Tour de France stage 14 on Saturday.
Charging solo up the last stretch of Pla d’Adet, Pogacar had to dodge a fan who leaped out to hurl a bag of chips at the Slovenian race leader.
The spectator did the same thing to Denmark’s Vingegaard, who came through moments later.
“The CPA will take legal action against this guy with pleasure due to what he did to both Pogacar and Vingegaard,” CPA President Adam Hansen wrote in a post on X on Saturday.
“This is disrespectful and will not be tolerated.”
Vingegaard finished 39 seconds behind Pogacar, while Belgium’s Remco Evenepoel, who was second in the general classification before stage 14, finished 70 seconds behind, meaning he slips to third overall behind the Dane.
“There was quite a bit of booing and someone was throwing chips, I heard also they threw the chips at Tadej and that’s strange to do,” Vingegaard said after the stage. “Just stay off the road. I don’t understand why you go to a bike race and boo at people.”
(Reporting by Shifa Jahan in Bengaluru; Editing by William Mallard)
