Three Grand Tour wins from three in 2023 for Team Jumbo-Visma 🇫🇷🇪🇸🇮🇹 Jonas Vingegaard, Sepp Kuss and Primoz Roglic show off their Tour de France, Vuelta a España and Giro d'Italia winners' jerseys. 📸 Cor Vos ________ 🇪🇸 #LaVuelta23
ANALYSIS | Golden opportunity for UAE to take revenge on Visma; It is possible to win all 2024 Grand Tours with Pogacar, Ayuso, Yates, Almeida or Del Toro
CyclingTuesday, 14 May 2024 at 23:16
Last year, Team Visma - Lease a Bike (at the time Jumbo-Visma) established itself as the best team in the World Tour by winning all three Grand Tours: Giro d'Italia, Tour de France and Vuelta a España; far ahead of UAE Team Emirates, which was hit especially hard by Tadej Pogacar's defeat in the Grande Boucle against Jonas Vingegaard for the second year in a row.
However, the 2024 season is far from being ideal for a Visma that started losing Primoz Roglic in the market, and with the course started has had very bad luck with injuries, as CiclismoAlDia's Jorge Borreguero argues. From this is where I will explain why UAE, with the help of Pogacar himself, Juan Ayuso, Adam Yates and a promising Isaac del Toro, has a great opportunity to leave its rival very weakened.
Tadej Pogacar is currently dominating the 2024 Giro d'Italia. @Sirotti
First of all, Wout van Aert was expected to make his debut as leader of the Dutch team at the Giro d'Italia. His crash at Dwars door Vlaanderen left him out of the spring classics, and out of the goal of competing to win a Corsa Rosa that, at the time of writing, is dominated by Pogacar precisely as UAE is not finding rivals to match him throughout the first 10 days of the race.
Eight days after Van Aert's injury came the worst moment of the year for Visma with the terrible accident of Jonas Vingegaard in the Basque Country, which caused the injury of the Dane and left his presence in a Tour de France that was destined to be historic. And that with the presence of the 'Big Four' would leave the winner of this edition with a very favorable narrative, both for the rider himself and for his team. However his presence is nothing but assured, as team CEO Richard Plugge himself has recently argued.
That said, UAE Team Emirates is being presented with a great opportunity to avenge a the 2023 season where they failed to win a Grand Tour despite their great roster. Barring a major surprise, Pogacar will win the Giro d'Italia in his first appearance. Visma is nowhere near him in the Corsa Rosa, with Cian Uijtdebroeks as their best overall man.
This potential victory in the first week of the Giro would leave Tadej Pogacar, who can now reserve his strength for his big goal of the year, with a great feeling for the Tour de France. With Vingegaard's situation already mentioned, it seems that his main rival will be a Primoz Roglic who managed to come out practically "unscathed" from two crashes at Itzulia Basque Country. And we will have to see how Remco Evenepoel recovers from his collarbone injury, and if he will be able to match the previously mentioned riders in the high mountains.
Juan Ayuso has proven himself this spring by winning the Itzulia Basque Country. @Sirotti
With a hypothetical Giro d'Italia - Tour de France double, Pogacar and UAE could already rate their 2024 season as outstanding. However, should they manage to win the first two grand tours, which would mean the end of Visma's dominance in the Tour, above all, it would be the ideal time for UAE to smell blood and go for the Vuelta a España win as well.
It would not be with Tadej Pogacar in the lineup, most likely. The Slovenian, after the Tour, still has to go to the Olympic Games, the World Championships and the last monument of the season: Il Lombardia. However, UAE has shown that it is much more than the Slovenian, and with the right lineup it would be more than capable of going for victory in the Vuelta a España.
There would be several possibilities for UAE to bring a competitive team to the Vuelta, but the one that could stand out above the rest would be one that takes advantage of the exceptional 2024 of Juan Ayuso and Isaac del Toro, as well as the presence of Adam Yates and João Almeida who race the Tour-Vuelta double.
Ayuso does not have the Vuelta a España scheduled on his racing calendar, as he will also be going to the Tour de France. However, it would be the ideal time for UAE and the rider himself to consider going all out for the final grand tour with a super squad that includes him, Yates and Del Toro.
Isaac Del Toro is one of the brightest developing talents in the peloton. @Sirotti
In short, with Tadej Pogacar as a possible winner of the Giro d'Italia and Tour de France, UAE could agree with Juan Ayuso to go as leader alongside Adam Yates to win the Vuelta a España with a successful selection of domestiques, and with Isaac del Toro as another star who, at the same time, would take the opportunity to debut in a grand tour and gain confidence for the coming years, where he will undoubtedly be one of the stars of the UAE team in the grand tours.
But, above all, and as I have already mentioned, UAE would thus get its revenge on Visma. In addition to leading the UCI Ranking, it would deliver a strong blow by winning the three grand tours after the historic milestone of the Dutch team in 2023.
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