Fan who threw crisps at Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard at Tour de France arrested - reports

The rider's union also threatens to take legal action against the spectator for the potato or maize-based incident

Tadej Pogačar on stage 14 of the Tour de France
(Image credit: Getty Images)

The spectator who threw crisps into the faces of Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard on stage 14 of the Tour de France was arrested, according to reports in the French press.

With around 2km to go of Saturday’s stage a man in a yellow hat chucked what appeared to be Bugles from the bag at the two riders, from UAE Team Emirates and Visma-Lease a Bike, respectively.

According to Le Parisien, the fan was arrested for “aggravated violence” and will be questioned on Sunday. According to a witness who spoke to the French newspaper, the man was arrested shortly after his stunt, and taken away in a police car.

"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. Just stay off the road and don’t boo anyone. I don’t understand why you go to a bike race and boo at people, “ Vingegaard said post-stage.

Pogačar won the stage by 39 seconds from Vingegaard, to strengthen his grip on the yellow jersey, despite the potato or maize-based incident.

“It was crisps in the face,” Mauro Gianetti, the UAE team boss, said. “The public is sometimes too excited, and a stupid thing happened. Fortunately, without a big problem, and nothing bad happened.”

However, despite “nothing bad” occurring, the rider’s union, the CPA, announced on Saturday night that legal action would be taken.

Adam Hansen, president of the CPA, said on X (formerly Twitter) that “the CPA will take legal action against this guy with pleasure due to what he did to both Pogačar and Vingegaard. This is disrespectful and will not be tolerated”.

Pat McQuaid, the former president of cycling’s governing body, the UCI, wrote on social media: “Disgraceful that the stage today was only barriered [in] the last 1.4km. Does a leading rider have to be brought down by a stupid spectator before they rectify this.”

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Adam Becket
News editor

Adam is Cycling Weekly’s news editor – his greatest love is road racing but as long as he is cycling, he's happy. Before joining CW in 2021 he spent two years writing for Procycling. He's usually out and about on the roads of Bristol and its surrounds.

Before cycling took over his professional life, he covered ecclesiastical matters at the world’s largest Anglican newspaper and politics at Business Insider. Don't ask how that is related to riding bikes.