While Visma-Lease a Bike have ensured that Jonas Vingegaard's racing the Giro d'Italia-Tour de France double in 2026 is a data-driven endeavour, the Dane couldn't help but highlight the less tangible factor of feeling "new energy" when it comes to why he's opted for a change in approach.
Ever since he broke through fully as a GC hopeful at the Tour in 2021, Visma have had a tried and tested approach to success at cycling's biggest race: altitude camp, Critérium du Dauphiné, altitude camp again, and then race the Tour.
Repeated in four of the past five seasons – only missing out in 2024 due to injury recovery – Vingegaard won two Tours in 2022 and 2023 ahead of main rival Tadej Pogačar, and has finished second at every other appearance. So why change it?
"When I won the Vuelta, I think pretty quickly the team could also see that I really wanted to do the Giro, so they also started looking into the data behind it," said Vingegaard at Visma's media day on Tuesday.
"Actually, we see that the two times that I've done the Vuelta after the Tour [in 2023 and 2025], I haven't been worse. I would say I've even been a bit better power-wise in the Vuelta, so we don't believe that it's a disadvantage for me.
"It's something that both the team and I are really motivated about, and it's like some kind of new energy. The last five years, I've done the same program, more or less, but changing it is something that I'm really motivated by. Personally, I really needed the change as well."
The Tour remains the most important race in cycling, for teams, riders and sponsors, so Vingegaard knows well that he can't neglect it, but winning the Giro d'Italia could take away some pressure before the Tour, and would place him alongside only seven male riders to have completed the full set of Grand Tour wins.
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Relaxed as ever as he spoke in La Nucia, Vingegaard did seem refreshed by his new calendar, but made sure to stress how he is confident that racing, and hopefully winning, the Giro will only be a benefit to the Tour, where he has lost convincingly to Pogačar the past two seasons.
He'll also only race twice before the Giro and the Tour, at the UAE Tour and Volta a Catalunya.
"By repeating what you do every year, you just kind of get into the same role, and you do the same every year," he said. "It's not that I'm not motivated, but it's more that sometimes you also need something new to increase your motivation again, and that's what we do now.
"I feel in myself that I have new energy that I haven't had for a few years.
"Of course, the Tour is the biggest race in the world, so that is the big goal as well. But I think you can also have both of them as pretty equal as goals."
Burnout
Yates and Vingegaard during the 2025 Tour (Image credit: Getty Images)
Vingegaard spoke about Simon Yates' surprising retirement from cycling, expressing how "he lost his motivation," while also empathising with the Brit, saying "I've also been close to burning out," having struggled himself to re-find the drive at low points in his career.
The word 'burnout' was floated around frequently on Visma's media day. Vingegaard is more than aware of the possibility, and staving it off seems to have made up part of their decision-making heading into 2026.
"Of course, it's very hard in cycling, and we speak a lot about burnouts at the moment, because we push ourselves to the limit," he said. "With all the altitude camps, with everything, with you always needing to be ready for a race – it's not like in the past that you come to a race, and you come there to get shape, no, you come to the race, and you want to win it.
"So obviously, there's more pressure on all the riders. For me personally, it's just about listening to who I am as a person and what I need, and I've said it many times, but it's something my wife really helps me with."
But for Vingegaard, being able to articulate that is something "I haven't always been able to, and that's probably also why it's been hard for me. But I think now I've also realised that if I keep doing that, I will have a burnout.
"So obviously, I needed to also say, 'OK, maybe we need to do something different.' That's something I've spoken with the team about, and we really agreed on, actually."
With these changes in mind, it is a place in an elite club that Vingegaard will be eyeing come May and July, one that includes his racing idol growing up, Alberto Contador. It would also get him to that feat before Pogačar – but it's not history or being the first since Chris Froome that the Dane is thinking about.
"It's not about being the first man of this generation. I think we all know that Tadej will do it sooner or later, I guess," he said. "It's more about being able to actually win all three of them.
"Obviously, I'm 29 now, and it's not like I have 10 years more in my career. So I also need to try to do it once I'm at my peak level, and I feel like I'm at my peak level now, so now is also the moment for me to do it."
James Moultrie is a gold-standard NCTJ journalist who joined Cyclingnews as a News Writer in 2023 after originally contributing as a freelancer for eight months, during which time he also wrote for Eurosport, Rouleur and Cycling Weekly. Prior to joining the team he reported on races such as Paris-Roubaix and the Giro d’Italia Donne for Eurosport and has interviewed some of the sport’s top riders in Chloé Dygert, Lizzie Deignan and Wout van Aert. Outside of cycling, he spends the majority of his time watching other sports – rugby, football, cricket, and American Football to name a few.
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