Jonas Vingegaard: Defending the Tour de France is hard but I’m up for the challenge

Three months after being crowned as the winner of the 2022 Tour de France, Jonas Vingegaard is gradually starting to enjoy it all. The intensity of his duel with Tadej Pogacar and all the stress of cycling’s biggest race are transforming into a sense of of quiet happiness and pride.

Vingegaard has opted to avoid the spotlight of Thursday’s presentation of the 2023 Tour de France in Paris but if he watches the presentation while enjoying the final days of his holidays, he can rightly savour the highlights video of his 2022 Tour victory.

Winning the 2022 Tour was life changing for the softly-spoken Jumbo-Visma rider, with a sudden wave of fame and public attention sweeping into his life. The 25-year-old started the Tour on home roads as a contender but then lived in a protective bubble as he raced the best three weeks of his life and fought to win the yellow jersey.

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When he emerged from the other end he was a national hero in Denmark. Nothing would ever be the same and he needed several weeks away from racing and the spotlight to take it all in and recover from the fatigue of the Tour.      

“It was definitely huge, bigger than I expected too. Everything was just so crazy for a period,” Vingegaard tells Cyclingnews.

“I still struggle to understand that all those people gathered there just to celebrate my success. That says a lot about the mentality of the Danes, they are such big sports fans. When you at the races, you don’t realise what you represent for your country.

“A lot has changed in my life but fortunately I haven’t changed, at least I hope so. I’m still the same person I was before I won the Tour de France.”  

Managing his emotions of the Tour de France

During and after the Tour, Vingegaard was often asked how he managed his emotions, due to concerns about how he handled expectancy and pressure. 

He always played down any major problems, but his partner Trine Hansen, his mother Karina and former coaches revealed to L’Equipe how he had suffered with anxiety before major races ever since he was a talented teenager and how it had often wrecked his chances of success.

Sessions with a mental coach helped overcome some of his worst fears and bouts of vomiting in his early years at Jumbo-Visma, while Hansen, who is 11 years his elder and an expert in marketing, taught him how to better manage his emotions by listening to his favourite songs or talking with teammates or team staff about something other than cycling.

Trine wisely adviced her husband to change his mobile phone number before this year’s Tour, and her support and presence during the final week made a huge difference. When Vingegaard often seemed to snub Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) as he warmed down in the podium area after stages, it was because he was immediately on the phone to Trine, describing it as “more important than anything.”  

Following his hero’s homecoming to Copenhagen, Vingegaard was suddenly like royalty. Bjarne Riis was feted the same way back on the balcony of Copenhagen's City Hall when he won the 1996 Tour, but his fall from grace to disgrace distanced many Danish cycling fans. The Tour Grand Départ in Denmark, and then Vingegaard's victory, reignited their love for the sport as well as their favourite form of transport.

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Vingegaard suddenly became the best bike rider Denmark has ever seen, and one of its greatest athletes. Yet instead of cashing in at the post-Tour criteriums, spending hours on national television or even riding the Tour of Denmark as a celebration, Vingegaard preferred to return home to Glyngøre and the quiet of isolated central Jutland, enjoying some privacy as he celebrated his Tour win with family and friends. He disappeared from the public view and didn’t race for two months.  

Comments of a ‘mental explosion’ were seemingly lost in translation but quickly connected to his former anxiety problems. Then Jumbo-Visma Directeur Sportif Frans Maassen justified Vingegaard’s absence from the Tour of Denmark by saying he had a “tough time since the Tour, what with everything that comes with it.”

Vingegaard knows his life will probably never be the same again but plays down any major problems and seems relaxed and grounded when talking to Cyclingnews. He is now pulled left and right to appease sponsors, fans and the media but seems to accept it all.

“The reports were exaggerated. There was no explosion, no mind bomb. I just needed a break, that’s all,” Vingegaard says.

“There were no problems, I just rested up and enjoyed some quality time with family and friends. I enjoyed a barbecue, a glass of wine or a beer. I don’t need much to be happy, even if I’ve won the Tour de France.”  

Vingegaard was criticised for disappearing from public view, especially in some parts of the Danish tabloid media, with even Riis suggesting he should somehow get on with it and ride the World Championships in Australia.

“I think it would have been a waste of time to go to Australia, the course just didn’t suit me,” Vingegaard responds, shrugging off any criticism and showing he has grown a thicker skin.  

“I’m different to lots of people, and in my opinion there should be room for everyone and everyone should have the right to do what they think is right for them.

“Not a lot of people think I deserved to take extra time off in the summer but I appreciate the people who do. As long as the team believe in what we do and we get the results when it matters most, then we’re happy.

“I could have raced but I had a feeling that I needed a break. I only took one race, the Bretagne Classic in France, out of my original race programme. Of course, I accept that you have to eventually think about the racing too and that’s why I went training in Spain in September and then rode the Cro Race. I think I ended the season pretty well and feel good about 2023.” 

Tour de France memories

A highlights video like that of the Tour presentation includes the biggest moments of the race, the stage wins, the drama, the crashes and the emotions. Vingegaard’s memories are far more complex, personal and numerous.

It all started with his speech in the Tivoli Gardens during the team presentation and ended with his wave to the thousands of people below him in the packed Copenhagen Town Hall square.

In between were 21 stages of racing; his solid start in the opening Copenhagen time trial on wet roads, surviving a moment of panic and multiple bike changes on the cobbled stage, the way he and Primož Roglič took turns to attack Pogačar on the Col du Galibier and then how he rode away from the Slovenian to take almost three minutes and the yellow jersey.

The ride across central France and through the Pyrenees was then all about retaining the yellow jersey, with Jumbo-Visma protecting Vingegaard from any risk and any anxiety all the way to Paris.        

Vingegaard chooses the performance and strength of the Jumbo-Visma team at the Tour as they best way to encapsulate his victory. Jumbo-Visma won six stages, Vingegaard won on the Col du Granon and on Hautacam, while Wout van Aert won three stages and the green points jersey. Christophe Laporte won stage 19 and Vingegaard also took home the polka-dot mountains jersey. It was a dominant haul.

“We wanted to win as a team, and we did,” Vingegaard says, perfectly staying on message for his team and sponsors.

“We had was a really good group of riders and worked really well together. The team spirit was one of the best I've experienced. The moment when Wout worked for me on the stage to Hautacam highlighted the way the guys rode for me but they committed to the race plan every day and we executed it perfectly. That makes me especially proud."

In his winner's press conference in July, Vingegaard had already pointed to the significance of that Hautacam stage. 

“It was after Hautacam when I really started believing. I mean, I always believed in it, but Hautacam was the point when I thought something had to go wrong for me not to win,” Vingegaard said then.

At the end of that same Tour press conference, Vingegaard was obliged to defend Jumbo-Visma’s dominance when he was asked if people could believe what they had seen at Tour. Teammate Wout van Aert later described it as a ‘shit question’ but Vingegaard accepted the premise and engaged with it.

“We are totally clean, every one of us, and I can say that to every one of you,” Vingegaard said.

“Not one of us is taking anything illegal. I think why we are so good is because of the preparation we do. We take altitude camps to the next level, and everything: materials, food and training. I think the team is really the best in this. That’s why you have to trust us.”

Enjoying the process

Vingegaard seems to enjoy the process of preparing for the Tour de France more than the attention, fame and expectation of the three weeks in July.

Some have predicted that he could be a one-time Tour winner, with a life goal ticked off and a preference to avoid the pressures of targeting the Tour de France year after year. Yet his love for the process seems to motivate him. It helped him return to form for the end of the season and will surely get him back out on the bike during the winter.

“I like the part where I prepare for a big race, the training and preparation. It’s interesting for me to see what I can do better, where we can learn from the year before and do better every year,” Vingegaard tells Cyclingnews.  

“I’m always thinking about the process and how it could be better. I’ve already been thinking about it for next season too. For example, I really want to avoid getting sick after Liège-Bastogne-Liège and so slowing my build-up to the Tour de France.”

Jumbo-Visma lead directeur sportif Merijn Zeeman has recently suggested that Vingegaard could miss the 2023 Tour de France, with the time trial heavy Giro d’Italia a possible alternative. But Vingegaard is ready for the challenge of defending his 2022 Tour victory.  

“We haven’t talked in detail with the team and we haven’t made a final plan for 2023 but the idea is to go back to the Tour de France. I’d be surprised if that wasn’t the plan,” he says.

“Being the defending Tour winner is always hard but I’m up for the challenge. I know it’ll be harder and harder to win it but that’s part of the challenge and now I have the experience of winning on my side. I know I just have to focus on myself, to be the best I can at the 2023 Tour de France.”