“Anything but a win is a failure for Pogacar” - Bruyneel and Wiggins see Jonas Vingegaard’s Giro d’Italia dominance flipping Tour de France pressure onto UAE

Jonas Vingegaard has left the Giro d’Italia with the maglia rosa, five stage wins and a completed Grand Tour set, but Johan Bruyneel believes the result also changes the balance of expectation before the Tour de France.

Bruyneel, the former US Postal and Discovery Channel sports director who helped guide Lance Armstrong’s Tour de France teams, argued on The Move’s Giro d’Italia review podcast that Vingegaard and Team Visma | Lease a Bike can now approach July from a position of strength without carrying the same burden as Tadej Pogacar and UAE Team Emirates - XRG.

“Jonas Vingegaard and Visma can now go into the Tour de France without a lot of pressure,” Bruyneel said. “They have won the Giro, Jonas has won every single race he started. He wants to win the Tour, but he comes in relaxed.”

Vingegaard’s Giro victory was emphatic. He finished 5:22 clear of Felix Gall, won five stages and became only the eighth men’s rider in history to win all three Grand Tours. Pogacar remains the reigning Tour champion and the dominant rider of the past two seasons, but Bruyneel believes that status brings its own weight. “Pogacar is now in a different situation because if you're the best and everybody expects you to win. Anything but a win is a failure for Pogacar and UAE,” Bruyneel said. “And this is not the case for Visma.”

Bradley Wiggins, the 2012 Tour de France winner and former Team Sky leader, also sees Vingegaard’s Giro route as a potential strength rather than a liability before July.

The old concern around the Giro-Tour double has usually been physical: too much racing, too much fatigue, too narrow a recovery window. Wiggins suggested that modern racing and recovery have changed that equation, especially for a rider whose recent Tour build-ups have been affected by injury and disruption. “I wonder how this is going to set him up for July,” Wiggins said. “This is the best Jonas Vingegaard we’ve seen over the last few years, since he won the Tour I would say.”

Vingegaard’s 2026 season has been close to flawless. Before winning the Giro, he had already taken overall victories at Paris-Nice and the Volta a Catalunya, giving him a sustained run of success before the Tour build-up begins in earnest.

“He’s won Paris-Nice already, won Catalunya,” Wiggins said. “So he's had a flawless season so far up to this point. It remains to be seen how that's going to set him up for July in the big challenge that comes against Tadej.”

Wiggins pushed back against the idea that Vingegaard would have been better served by avoiding the Giro altogether. “He’s tried the other way. A couple of times,” he said. “I actually think that this will set him up better than we’ve seen him in previous years at the Tour de France.”

That view gives Vingegaard’s Giro a different complexion. Rather than being framed only as a demanding pre-Tour gamble, it becomes part of a deliberate attempt to build rhythm, confidence and race sharpness before the biggest duel of the season.

Wiggins was not ready to predict that Vingegaard will beat Pogacar in July, but he believes the Dane has earned the right to arrive with greater confidence than in recent seasons.

“He’s won five stages, looks to be in the form of his life in terms of numbers and the stats,” Wiggins said. “Going into this Tour de France he can be confident that he can push Tadej more than he has done in previous years.”

Visma’s Giro was not only about Vingegaard’s individual superiority. Sepp Kuss won the queen stage, Davide Piganzoli finished eighth overall and second in the young rider classification, and the team controlled the decisive mountain stages with little sign of panic.

Bruyneel pointed to that collective execution as a major part of Vingegaard’s position before the Tour. “Take Pogacar and UAE out of the equation and Visma almost never fails,” he said. “The way they have prepared, the way they have controlled, and the way they have executed, their strategy has been flawless.”

That line also sharpens the July contrast. UAE have the rider who has set the standard in modern cycling, but Visma leave the Giro with a leader who has kept winning, a team that has just controlled a Grand Tour, and a race programme that Wiggins believes could leave Vingegaard better prepared than in previous years.

Bruyneel also pointed to the mental side of the rivalry, with the expectation around Pogacar creating a different kind of cost. “It changes a lot in the approach because you know there's the physical fitness, the physical tiredness, but mentally also we have a lot of energy wasted on stress, nerves, pressure, and I think this is an advantage,” he said. “He comes in really relaxed and if he finishes second in the Tour de France behind Pogacar, everyone says, ‘Okay, great job.’”

The Tour will decide whether the Giro has sharpened Vingegaard or drained him. For now, Visma leave Italy with the first Grand Tour of the year, a leader still on a perfect 2026 run, and the pressure debate already turning towards UAE.