Mathieu Burgaudeau of B&B Hotels-KTM won the Point d’Appui on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées during the final stage the 2022 Tour de France. He finished 68th, the middle of the 135 riders who survived to the finish.
Andreas Kron of Lotto Soudal, who held the fulcrum position at the end of Stage 19 slipped back to 73rd place by the end of Stage 21. Burgaudeau, on the other hand, spent the entire Tour slowly gaining placement, finishing in 171st place on Stage 1 individual time trial. He slowly chipping away at his deficit, gaining more than 100 places over the course of the 21-stage race.
The French rider Burgaudeau won Stage 6 of the 2022 Paris-Nice race on the ride from Courthézon to Aubagne, France. In 2015, he won the mountain-climbing classification in the Tour du Pays de Vaud, a couple of stages in the 2016 Tour du Valromey, the green jersey in the 2016 Aubel–Thimister–La Gleize, and the white jersey in the 2018 Tour de Gironde, where he finished 3rd overall.
This was his second Tour de France, finishing 131st during the 2020 edition.
Toms Skujiņš, a rider for Trek Segefredo who won the Point d’Appui in the 2021 Tour, finished in 61st place overall this year, several spots above last year’s fulcrum finish.
The winner of the yellow jersey in this year’s tour, Jonas Vinkegaard of Jumbo-Visma, who slipped 2 minutes ahead of Tadej Pogacar on Stage 11 and never faced a real threat during the remainder of the race, matching all attacks by Pogacar in the Pyrenees. Pogacar, who won the 2020 and 2021 Tours de France, retained the white jersey for best young rider again. Vinkegaard also won the polka dot jersey for best mountain climbing. His teammate, Wout van Aert, won three stages on the way to winning the green jersey for best sprinter.
Five American riders out of seven starters finished the 2,068-mile stage race with Neilson Powless of EF Education-EasyPost placing highest at 13th overall. Seth Kuss of Jumbo-Visma was next at 17th place.
Here’s the leader stage by stage in the GC contest for the Point d’Appui:
- Stage 1 — No fulcrum
- Stage 2 — No fulcrum
- Stage 3 — No fulcrum
- Stage 4 — No fulcrum
- Stage 5 — No fulcrum
- Stage 6 — No fulcrum
- Stage 7 — No fulcrum
- Stage 8 — No fulcrum
- Stage 9 — Pierre-Luc Périchon of Cofidis
- Stage 10 — Matis Louvel of Team Arkéa-Samsic
- Stage 11 — Philippe Gilbert of Lotto Soudal
- Stage 12 — Jonathan Castroviejo of INEOS Grenadiers
- Stage 13 — Kristian Sbaragli of Alpecin-Deceuninck
- Stage 14 — Quinn Simmons of Trek-Segafredo/USA
- Stage 15 — No fulcrum
- Stage 16 — No fulcrum
- Stage 17 — Stan DeWulf of AG2R Citroen Team
- Stage 18 — No fulcrum
- Stage 19 — Andreas Kron of Lotto Soudal
- Stage 20 — No fulcrum
- Stage 21 — Mathieu Burgaudeau of B&B Hotels-KTM
The Lanterne Rouge was held by Anthony Turgis of TotalEnergies from Stage 3 through Stage 12 of the race until sprinter Caleb Ewan of Lotto Soudal suffered his second crash of the tour and landed him at the back of the pack.
Somehow Ewan managed to stay close enough to the finishers during each following stage to stay within the time cutoff and continue in the race. In the second crash, which happened during State 13, he suffered knee trauma but tried to catch the peloton without success. To add insult to injury, though, Ewan was fined and docked 1 minute of time and points in both the sprinting and mountain-climbing competitions for drafting off a motor vehicle while trying to get back to the peloton. The team car that he followed, from another team no less, was also fined. Despite being the last-place rider for the general classification, Ewan made it into the mix for the sprint finish on the Champs-Élysées.
Point d'Appui 