2024 Season Review | Team Visma | Lease a Bike: Jonas Vingegaard proves his greatness despite defeat, as Wout van Aert struggles with injuries, and the team suffers with a 2023 hangover
Cycling
As the professional cycling world begins its preparations for the 2025 season, we have been looking back at how each time performed throughout 2024, and today we’re looking at one of the heavy hitters. For Team Visma | Lease a Bike, the 2024 season was marked by a mix of highs and lows. The team, formerly known as Jumbo-Visma, entered the year with immense expectations following an extraordinary 2023 season that saw them sweep all three Grand Tours. With Primoz Roglic, Jonas Vingegaard, and Sepp Kuss claiming the Giro d’Italia, Tour de France, and Vuelta a España respectively, the team blew away the opposition in 2023 with one of the greatest seasons we’ve ever seen.
But 2024 presented new challenges. Primoz Roglic departed for Red Bull – Bora – hansgrohe, injuries and illness plagued key riders, and Tadej Pogacar’s own all time great season shifted the balance of power. Despite these setbacks, Visma | Lease a Bike still finished second in the UCI rankings with 20,428 points and claimed 32 victories across the year. However, this was a significant drop from their 29,654 points in 2023. The team’s talent was still evident, but it was clear this season would not match the glory of the previous year.
Under the leadership of CEO Richard Plugge, Visma | Lease a Bike remains a powerhouse of the peloton. The team’s management has built a force within the peloton based on talent development and supreme innovation, which continue to be their guiding principles. Despite a turbulent season, their ability to regroup and deliver competitive results highlights their strength as a WorldTour team.
Let’s take a closer look at their year, starting with the spring classics and moving into the Grand Tours before wrapping up with a look at their transfers and plans for what the Dutch team will hope will be a return to glory in 2025.
Spring season
Visma | Lease a Bike began the season on a strong note, as Olav Kooij kicked off their campaign with a victory at the Clasica de Almeria, followed by another win on stage 5 of the UAE Tour. Wout van Aert, one of the peloton’s very best riders, added to the tally with a stage win at the Volta ao Algarve. Jonas Vingegaard then demonstrated his formidable form by dominating O Gran Camino, where he won three stages and the overall GC, signalling that he was ready to continue his 2023 brilliance. Vingegaard followed this with two stage wins and the overall title at Tirreno-Adriatico, earning 250 UCI points and reinforcing his reputation as one of the sport’s elite riders.
However, the team’s primary focus for the spring was winning either the Tour of Flanders or Paris-Roubaix, two monuments that have so far eluded them. Early signs were promising. Jan Tratnik claimed a victory at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, earning 225 points, while Van Aert triumphed at Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne the following day. The team seemed poised for a successful classics campaign.
Then came the setbacks. The E3 Saxo Classic saw crashes take out Van Aert, Dylan van Baarle, and Jan Tratnik, derailing their momentum. Matters worsened at Dwars door Vlaanderen, where Van Aert crashed again, breaking his collarbone and several ribs in a high speed fall, and his injuries ruled him out of both the Giro d’Italia and the remainder of the spring classics. Matteo Jorgenson provided some consolation with a victory at Dwars door Vlaanderen, earning 225 points, but illness prevented him from performing at his best in Flanders or Roubaix.
The team managed to salvage some results in other classics. Tiesj Benoot secured a third-place finish at the Amstel Gold Race, but their spring campaign was ultimately overshadowed by injuries and missed opportunities.
Of course, we’re missing perhaps the most defining moment of Visma’s entire 2024, as the season’s most devastating moment came in April at the Itzulia Basque Country. Jonas Vingegaard, riding in a showdown against Roglic and Remco Evenepoel, suffered a catastrophic crash on a descent. The injuries, a broken collarbone, broken ribs, and a collapsed lung, hospitalised him for 12 days and threw his Tour de France title defence into serious doubt.
But would he recover in time for July?
Grand Tour season
The Giro d’Italia was a subdued affair for Visma | Lease a Bike, and with no serious GC contenders due to injuries, the team relied on Olav Kooij for stage results. Kooij delivered with a win on stage 9, providing a rare and much needed highlight in an otherwise quiet race.
The focus then shifted to the Tour de France. The big question was whether Jonas Vingegaard, just three months removed from his horrific crash, could compete with Tadej Pogacar, who had already decimated the field at the Giro. With a week to go before the Tour, Visma | Lease a Bike announced that Vingegaard would return to defend his title, and so his Tour de France campaign once again became the focal point of the team’s season. But could he really be back to his best just months on from the Basque country horror?
Vingegaard silenced doubts early on. On stage 2, during the San Luca climb, he was the only rider able to stay with Pogacar, setting the stage for another epic chapter of the inseparable duos rivalry. However, cracks in Visma’s strategy and power appeared on stage 4, as without Sepp Kuss, who missed the Tour due to COVID-19, Vingegaard found himself isolated on the Col du Galibier. UAE Team Emirates, armed with arguably the best climbing squad ever assembled, including Adam Yates, João Almeida, and Juan Ayuso, applied relentless pressure. Vingegaard managed to follow Pogacar’s attacks for a while but was ultimately dropped, losing nearly a minute on the GC. In that moment there and then it was clear in just one year the balance had shifted, and UAE Team Emirates now had more firepower than Visma.
That stage symbolised Vingegaard’s Tour, as he remained Pogacar’s closest challenger in the mountains but couldn’t match his rival’s dominance. Pogacar won six stages and the overall GC, claiming his third Tour title, while Vingegaard settled for second. However, his mental strength and ability to recover from such a severe injury cannot be overstated, and he also managed to win stage 11 by outsprinting Pogacar, which was probably the team’s highlight of the season.
The Vuelta a Espana began with high hopes for Wout van Aert, who sought redemption after a winless Tour for the second year in a row. Van Aert started strong, winning stages 3, 7, and 10, and leading both the points and mountains classifications, but once again an injury was just around the corner for the Belgian. Unfortunately, his campaign ended abruptly with a crash on stage 16, cutting short what had been a promising race, and leaving the 30 year old with a nasty knee injury.
Transfers
Visma | Lease a Bike’s offseason has been busy so far, with several key signings and departures. Simon Yates joined the team, bringing experience and climbing expertise to a squad in need of depth. Yates could be a brilliant signing for the team and for Vingegaard, and we can’t wait to see him go up against his brother Adam who rides in support of Tadej Pogacar.
Victor Campenaerts also returns to the team, adding versatility and huge wealth of experience. Promising young talents like U23 World Champion Niklas Behrens and Axel Zingle join the squad, bolstering both their classics and developmental rosters. Meanwhile, the team bid farewell to Jan Tratnik, who moved to Red Bull – Bora – hansgrohe, after the Slovenian spent the last two years with Visma.
Perhaps the most significant moment of the off season so far was Wout van Aert signing a lifetime contract with Visma. The Belgian still has a few years of his prime left, and he’ll be desperate to add to his one monument win, and get back to Tour de France stage winning ways, in the coming years.
Final verdict: 7/10
Look, it was always going to be pretty much impossible for the team to replicate their 2023 season. Team Visma | Lease a Bike entered 2024 with sky-high expectations but faced one of their most challenging seasons in years, and a campaign littered with crashes was not what they needed. Yet, even without the crashes, does anyone truly believe they would have beaten Tadej Pogacar and UAE Team Emirates in 2024? Or were they just comfortably beaten into second place this year?
Despite these challenges, the team secured 32 victories and a second-place finish in the UCI rankings. Jonas Vingegaard’s incredible Tour de France comeback and Wout van Aert’s first two weeks of the Vuelta were standout moments, however, the team’s lack of depth in critical races, particularly the Tour and the classics.
With new signings like Simon Yates and the development of young talents like Niklas Behrens, Visma | Lease a Bike is poised for a stronger 2025. The question remains whether they can reclaim their dominance, but one thing is certain: this team has the talent and determination to compete at the highest level.
But can they turn the tables on Tadej Pogacar and UAE in 2025?
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