Both
Het Laatste Nieuws and La Gazzetta dello Sport's
Ciro Scognamiglio have reported this Tuesday morning, that
Jonas Vingegaard is set to try and emulate
Tadej Pogacar next season by taking on the daunting task of a
Giro d'Italia -
Tour de France double.
Is this actually the case though? Well according to the
Team Visma | Lease a Bike communications manager, Sander Kleikers, things may not be completely as pictured by reports. "I really don't know where it comes from. It certainly does not come from our team," Kleikers says when quizzed on the rumours by Danish outlet,
Ekstra Bladet. "We haven't even started the evaluation of this season. I don't know where it comes from. It is very surprising."
Vingegaard has two Maillot Jaune's from the Tour de France already on his palmares, plus a 2nd place from the 2023 Vuelta a Espana, but the Dane has never before travelled to Italy for the opening Grand Tour of the season. With his 2024 season already done as well, Vingegaard also has plenty of time to prepare and plan for his 2025 campaign. More on this story as it develops.
Before Pogacar in 2024, no one since the late great Marco Pantani has managed to complete mythical Giro d'Italia and Tour de France double in the same season, all the way back in 1998. In truth however, the Slovenian leader of UAE Team Emirates made it look relatively simple. After dominating the 2024 Giro d'Italia and winning by nearly ten minutes, Pogacar then travelled to France where he and Vingegaard did battle for the fourth year in a row. As both riders posted some of the best watts ever seen, it was eventually Pogacar who prevailed by over six minutes, levelling the score at two Maillot Jaunes apiece in the duos already legendary Tour de France rivalry.
You wrote: "[...] it was eventually Pogacar who prevailed by over six minutes, levelling the score at two Maillot Jaunes apiece in the duos already legendary Tour de France rivalry."
Which of Tadej's 3 TdF victories do you not count?
Correct or not, this makes sense from Jonas' point of view - he may have realised that beating Pog in a straight fight in the Tour is prob. going to difficult, and Pog is unlikely to do the Giro in '25 and will take on the Tour / Vuelta, to complete his GT set, meaning that Jonas should be able to add a GT win to his palmares in '25....
I think maybe the one thing Jonas and the rest of Visma learned this year is that a crash can uproot any season plans.
Jonas is the only guy who can compete with Pogi.
Winning a Giro and losing the Tour isn’t a bad season. However, when he mainly focuses on the Tour, and doesn’t win. It’s almost like a lost season.
Beating a healthy Pog in the Tour is tough, but Jonas did it in 2022, so he could well do it again.
It's funny - less than a year ago folks were saying Pogi was doing the Giro-Tour because he knew he couldn't beat Jonas in the tour and he wanted a consolation GT win in 2024.
It's also important to remember that in 25 TdF Visma can enter even stronger than 24 UAE if Kuss, WVA, Matteo and Yates all comes well.
That's one reason we don't trust anyone anywhere!