“], “filter”: { “nextExceptions”: “img, blockquote, div”, “nextContainsExceptions”: “img, blockquote, a.btn, a.o-button”} }”>
Jonas Vingegaard is in a race against time to catch up to Tadej Pogačar in time for the Tour de France, and Visma-Lease a Bike is backing him to do it via a wafer-thin competition schedule.
After all, who needs to race when you can go to altitude instead?
“We know this approach works for him,” Vingegaard’s trainer Tim Heemskerk said. “Some people may say not racing much is ‘a risk,’ but for us it’s proven to work.
“We understand that people want to see Jonas race more before the Tour de France, like at Tour de Romandie, for example,” Heemskerk told Velo.
“But we make a plan that gives us a bigger chance in the key period that matters most to Jonas and all us who work with him.”
Vingegeaard revealed last week he will race just once before he squares off with Pogačar and the rest of the “Big-4” at the Tour de France.
Despite earlier rumors, there’s no replacement stage-race to fill the void left when a concussion thwarted Vingegaard’s plan to race the Volta a Catalunya.
Heemskerk defended a training decision that drew every reaction possible from social media physiologists.
“We considered all options for preparing the Tour de France. He could race Romandie and go for the win there, but what does that mean later? The Tour is the race that matters most to him, and us at the team,” Heemskerk said in a WhatsApp call.
“We know Jonas doesn’t race a lot, but he wants to spend time with his family and be away from all the hecticness of racing. We respect that.”
Paris-Nice crash and concussion ‘a big setback’
The Critérium du Dauphiné in June will be the first time in three months that Vingegaard will race after he crashed and abandoned Paris-Nice in mid-March.
The eight-day tour will complete a long road back for the two-time maillot jaune.
Heemskerk revealed to Velo the 28-year-old only returned to full training last week after he finally shook off the hangover of his brain injury.
All told, the Tour de France star was away from all-things-intensity for five full weeks.
“It was a big setback,” Heemskerk said. “The leaders of a team want to win races, so it was a blow mentally and physically when you do months of training over winter.
“And of course, we’d spent a lot of winter working on Jonas’ muscle mass and explosivity too, he lacked that after last year,” Heemkerk said, referring back to his rider’s brutal crash in the Basque Country.
“But we’re now with an opportunity to start back earlier than we used to. Many riders will rest now, but Jonas is back training.”
Vingegaard is BACK!
Next up: Criterium du Dauphine
Then: Tour de France#cycling | #couchpeloton pic.twitter.com/KMbegH6G0p— SBS Sport (@SBSSportau) April 24, 2025
The Dauphiné is the first big date in Vingegaard’s summer schedule.
He’ll line out against the monument-munching might of Pogačar for the first time this year at a June race seen as a harbinger of Tour de France form. Remco Evenepoel throws another challenge into this crucial tune-up tour.
After the Dauphiné, Vingegaard will spend another three weeks in thin air for a “now-or-never” finishing camp in Tignes.
“We think Jonas is in a good place to make this work. At Paris-Nice he was in good shape already. Not in Tour de France shape, but he’d not been to altitude yet,” Heemskerk said.
“We know once he’s at with the team at Sierra Nevada [in May] we’ll get him to a really high level,” he continued. “This program is what worked when he won [the Tour de France] in 2022 and 2023.”
‘You cannot mimic peloton skills in training’
Yet Heemskerk knows that no amount of oxygen-deprived intervals will ready Vingegaard for the broiling intensity of the bunch.
Vingegaard will have only 18 race-days on his 2025 resume when he lines up for the Tour de France. Look back further, and he will only have 26 days of competition since he took the step below Pogačar last July on the Champs-Élysées.
Pogačar and Evenepoel will see similar pre-Tour totals in what’s a reflection of the new norm to train rather than race.
“We see many riders race really well with just training preparation. We saw that with Jonas last year, he didn’t race at all before he finished at the Tour,” Heemskerk said. “But we know there are things like peloton skills that you cannot mimic in training. Both are important.”
“Peloton skills” and the mastercraft of moving around the bunch might be the elephant in the Visma-LAB boardroom.
Jonas Vingegaard was in a lot of pain after the finish, looks like he hurt his left wrist quite bad. According to some info, he was also dizzy after the crash. With a cold and rainy weekend ahead, he might not start tomorrow’s stage…#ParisNice pic.twitter.com/bxLTbTJdlD
— Mihai Simion (@faustocoppi60) March 13, 2025
Vingegaard suffered devastating injuries and a five-week layoff last year in that descending crash in the Basque Country. His highly consequential spill 10 months later at Paris-Nice threw him back to the sidelines.
If Vingegaard is left with any nerves or hesitancy, the Critérium du Dauphiné will have to act as an eight-day therapy session.
The opening week of the Tour de France across the sinuous, complex parours of Normandy and Brittany won’t take prisoners of the timid.
You can’t control Pogačar, but you can prime the physiology of Vingegaard
It’s likely that tricky parcours and narrow descents will be the least of Vingegaard’s problems in July.
Heemskerk acknowledged Vingegaard’s archrival Pogačar has been “incredible” this year. The whole Visma-Lease a Bike entourage also previously recognized that the team needs to “close the gap” to the world champion.
“Pogačar can win in almost any situation unless it’s a bunch sprint. It’s special to see,” Heemskerk said last week. “But what he does will not impact our approach.
“Maybe we will make an analysis of his strengths, but he can do anything.”
And while the Tour de France isn’t a w/kg contest, Heemskerk was keeping faith that the physiology counts for Vingegaard’s big rematch with Pogačar.
That’s why he’s planning to make sure the Dane turns up for the French Départ a physiological monster.
As Vingeaard’s long-time trainer, Heemskerk has mapped out a training framework based on their winning preparations in 2022 and 2023. Tweaks have been made to reflect lost race days.
“There’s no point worrying about what Pogačar is doing,” Heemskerk told Velo. “We control what we can control. And that means making a good head-start on Jonas’ fitness, then considering what we might need to change after what we see in the Dauphiné.
“With already a good training week this week and the upcoming period before we go to Sierra, we are making a head start on our rivals.”
The horrifying realization as the W/kg numbers came out latter that day that even though Vingegaard crushed every other climbing performance in history he still got brutalized by Pogacar. 7 W/kg for 40 minutes is hard to comprehend
— Natskyge (@natskyge) April 26, 2025
Pogačar admitted after his solo blitz on Liège that he needs downtime after his audacious, arduous spring classics campaign.
Evenepoel bounced straight from Liège to the Tour de Romandie, and Primož Roglič … he’s racing the friggin’ Giro d’Italia.
Meanwhile, Vingegaard will live like a monk and ride like a madman in his Tour de France boot camp.
“In a few weeks he’ll be ahead of schedule compared to previous years,” Heemskerk said. “He missed out on racing but he’s got a head start on training and bodyweight before he goes to altitude.”
‘It’s nicer to need one more little step than to already be top of the mountain’
The Dauphiné is seen as the final level exam ahead of the Tour de France. It’s the race where every acceleration and micro-move is scrutinized and extrapolated to what comes a few weeks later.
But Heemkerk suggested they won’t get the jitters at any disappointment in mid-June.
“After the Dauphiné, we go back to Tignes to become better, or to simply hold fitness, so we’re not good too early. The Dauphiné is really important because we will get an analysis of Jonas, but also of the competitors. And the three weeks after that give us a lot of time,” he said.
“When I’ve seen Jonas in really good form before the Dauphiné I get a bit nervous. It makes me worry if he can keep his shape through to the end of the Tour,” Heemskerk continued.
“It’s nicer to need to make one more little step than to already be at the top of the mountain.”
Vingegaard has 10 weeks to get out of the foothills and onto the upper slopes of Heemskerk’s fitness mountain. The summit push begins in Lille on July 5.
