"If you have the opportunity to win all three grand tours..." - Johan Bruyneel on Jonas Vingegaard's Giro-Tour double, battles with UAE's Pogacar and Almeida

Jonas Vingegaard's plan to race the Giro d'Italia and Tour de France was already apparent for a long time but has now been confirmed by Team Visma | Lease a Bike while the plan for most of the season has been built. The Dane is going to attempt to complete his set of Grand Tours this may at the Giro and Johan Bruyneel argues this may also help him in the pursuit of the Tour de France against Tadej Pogacar.

"If you have the opportunity to win all three grand tours, and at the end of your career, you can say 'I am one of the few who has won three grand tours', you have to take it," Bruyneel argued in The Move podcast. "There is Merckx, there is Froome and Hinault (to name a few, others have done it, ed.), but Indurain never won all three."

It is in fact an historic feat that only a few riders have achieved in the history of the sport, and this list does not include Tadej Pogacar, who has won the Giro and Tour, but never the Vuelta. Last fall, Vingegaard rode to an overall win at the final Grand Tour of the season, beating João Almeida despite not having his best level throughout the second half of the race - fruit of an illness, whilst fatigue from the Tour could've also been a factor. After winning the Vuelta it became obvious that winning the Giro would be the next step.

Vingegaard starts his season at the UAE Tour, races the Volta a Catalunya, and then takes on an altitude camp before the Corsa Rosa where the Belgian pundit argues that he is the man to beat. "He is probably going to win the Giro, if his preparation goes well. He probably won't race between the Giro and the Tour. I think it's doable, but would he be mentally giving up a little bit on the dominance of Pogacar?"

Potentially that would be the case, but in modern cycling a lot has changed, and riders's schedules are planned in a way that reaching their best level in two Grand Tours in a row is not an unusual sight. Even the Giro-Tour double, previously thought to be almost impossible to race at the highest level consecutively, has been tried more often and in Tadej Pogacar's case back in 2024, succeeded in every imaginable way.

And for Vingegaard's chances of winning the Tour, a presence at the Giro may not make much of a difference. Over the past two seasons Pogacar was head and shoulders above the rest, and it became clear that winning the Tour depended on his ability to stay consistent and healthy, not Vingegaard's climbing ability.

"Saying 'it is highly unlikely that I can win the Tour, unless there's circumstances. So I'm going to go for the Giro. Then I'll see what the Tour brings'. That would be my takeaway from his decision," Bruyneel adds.

"I don't think Pogacar was in the same mindset. Because he's dominating. The Tour, the season, the whole cycling world. You're going up against a cannibal."

At the Tour the likes of Remco Evenepoel and Florian Lipowitz can prove to be very worthy contenders of a second place, or perhaps higher if the Slovenian's domination is no more; but Vingegaard being present at the Tour is always a given because a healthy Pogacar is never a guarantee.

"You have to be there, and just try. There's always circumstances: there is no guarantee that Pogacar is going to have a clean race without any issues every year. He crashed last year, and it could have been a lot worse. Then you have to be in pole position to win."

And for Bruyneel, the presence at the Giro may see Vingegaard go into the Tour with much less pressure than the past few years, if he indeed is able to succeed. This could ultimately prove to be quite beneficial. "If he goes to the Giro and wins it, he starts the Tour with almost no pressure. Everything that happens is fine. It's not like you have to make up for your season."

However it can in no way be given that Vingegaard will succeed at the Corsa Rosa, taking into consideration the rivals that will be at the start, the unstable weather and the crashes that have in recent years changed the outlook of the GC battles significantly.

"He still has to win it, of course. But he's the second best stage rider in the world, there's no doubt about that. Tadej Pogacar is going full gas for the Tour, and for Jonas, João Almeida will be his main rival. He has already shown he can beat him," however. In Italy, it will likely be UAE that will give most of the fight to Visma, but it will be a rather equal battle as neither team will be present with their strongest supporting lineups.

But Vingegaard is the man to beat in Bruyneel's opinion, taking into consideration what happened last August and September. "That was a Jonas who was in my opinion not at his best. He still managed to win it, quite dominantly I would say. It was close, and not at the same time. In the last stage, he just rode away from everybody. Was he ever put in trouble by Almeida? The only guy who did that in the Vuelta was Tom Pidcock. Almeida couldn't really drop Vingegaard."