Visma-Lease a Bike have announced their squad to support Jonas Vingegaard at the Tour de France, with no real surprises in the eight-man team heading to Barcelona on July 4.
10-time Tour stage winner and 2022 green jersey winner Wout van Aert will miss the race for the first time since joining Visma in 2019. He’s out with an elbow injury sustained in a training crash before the recent Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes.
There was much speculation over who would replace the Belgian in the lineup, with his place the lone spot yet to be confirmed.
Names in the frame for the place included Ben Tulett, Wilco Kelderman, Jørgen Nordhagen, and Davide Piganzoli, and it’s Piganzoli who takes Van Aert’s place on the Tour team.
The 23-year-old Italian is a rising star in the peloton, having finished eighth at the Giro d’Italia while supporting Vingegaard to the maglia rosa. He won La Route d’Occitanie earlier this month, and he’ll be making his career Tour debut as the youngest member of the Visma squad.
Elsewhere, the lineup is the same as previously announced. The American pairing of climbing lieutenant Sepp Kuss and all-rounder Matteo Jorgenson lead the selection. The pair have nine Tour appearances between them, with Jorgenson’s eighth place in 2024 their best GC result.
French time trial champion Bruno Armirail is the sole French representative in the squad. The 32-year-old is taking part in his first Tour for the Dutch team since joining from Decathlon CMA CGM over the winter and accompanied Vingegaard at Paris-Nice and the Volta a Catalunya in the spring.
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Edoardo Affini will make his second Tour de France start. The Italian is a strong time triallist and was the team’s top finisher at last year’s stage 5 time trial in Caen.
Norwegian Per Strand Hagenes makes his Grand Tour debut at the Tour. The 22-year-old replaces Christophe Laporte in the selection after the Frenchman was ruled out of this summer’s racing with a torn thigh muscle in May.
Along with Armirail, Affini and Hagenes, Victor Campenaerts will form Visma’s rouleur core. The quartet will do their part to control the peloton, chase down breakaways, guard Vingegaard, and power the opening stage team time trial effort. The Belgian is riding his fourth Tour de France and was part of the team’s victorious Giro squad alongside Kuss and Piganzoli.
Vingegaard is aiming to become the ninth rider to complete the Giro-Tour double, following in the wheeltracks of Eddy Merckx, Fausto Coppi, Miguel Indurain, and his great rival, Tadej Pogačar.
He’ll once again go head-to-head with the Slovenian this July as he tries to win the Tour for a third time. The world champion will be his main rival for the yellow jersey, while debutant Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) and Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) are among the other major contenders.
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