"Isn't Jonas saying he needs all the help he can get to fight this Pogacar?" - Trine Vingegaard criticism revisited as Wout van Aert's absence changes Visma's Tour plan

Wout van Aert will not be part of Team Visma | Lease a Bike’s 2026 Tour de France squad. Neither will Christophe Laporte. For Jonas Vingegaard, that changes the shape of a yellow-jersey challenge that has so often relied on Visma’s ability to control the race across almost every type of terrain.

It also brings one of last summer’s most awkward Visma debates back into focus. Twelve months ago, Trine Marie Hansen, Vingegaard’s wife, caused a stir by questioning whether the team could afford to chase anything other than yellow with her husband.

Her comments were widely read as criticism of Van Aert’s own stage ambitions, given the Belgian’s status as both a Tour winner in his own right and one of Vingegaard’s most important helpers.

This year, that exact dilemma is gone. Van Aert is absent through injury, Laporte is also missing, and Vingegaard heads to the Tour with a different support structure around him. Tadej Pogacar, however, is again waiting in July, and former professional Stef Clement believes the old criticism still touches on a live sporting issue for Visma.

Van Aert’s past Tour work for Vingegaard is part of why Trine’s comments landed so heavily. In 2022, the Belgian played a decisive role on Hautacam as Pogacar was distanced and Vingegaard tightened his grip on yellow. Across those Tours, Van Aert was rarely just one thing: stage hunter, engine, green jersey contender, lead-out option, rescue rider and mountain helper all at once.

Speaking on the NOS Wielerpodcast, Clement returned to the difficulty of balancing those ambitions when Pogacar is the rider Visma have to beat. “Is it not so that if you go to the Tour de France with Van Aert, Laporte and an Affini, that you always want to play the Van Aert card a few times?” Clement asked. “Maybe Vingegaard was bothered by that.”

Clement then placed Vingegaard’s previous Tour success against the changing level of Pogacar. The Dane beat Pogacar in 2022 and 2023, but the Slovenian’s build-up was disrupted in the second of those editions by his crash at Liege-Bastogne-Liege. “Not to take anything away from Vingegaard, but he wins the Tour of 2023 because of a disrupted preparation after that crash of Pogacar in Liege,” Clement said.

Visma took full advantage that year. Pogacar is now back at the Tour as defending champion, a four-time winner and the rider who has set the standard across the 2026 season.

“But you are facing an increasingly strong Pogacar,” Clement continued. “Isn't Jonas saying he needs all the help he can get to fight this Pogacar? Is he not wondering whether it is still possible to bet on two horses?”

Van Aert’s absence means Visma will not have to split any Tour resources around his stage ambitions this time. There is no Van Aert card to play, and no repeat of the same external debate that followed the team last year.

There is also no Van Aert to cover the kind of stages where he has so often changed the race. His absence takes away a rider able to protect Vingegaard on flat and rolling days, chase back after chaos, survive deep into mountain stages and still give Visma a winning option when the yellow-jersey fight pauses.

Laporte’s absence adds to that gap. Visma still bring serious depth, with Sepp Kuss, Matteo Jorgenson, Edoardo Affini, Victor Campenaerts, Bruno Armirail, Per Strand Hagenes and Davide Piganzoli all named alongside Vingegaard. It is a squad built around the Dane, but not the same multi-purpose unit that has so often shaped the Tour around him.

Clement also questioned how much the missing names can change if the leader cannot match Pogacar at the decisive moments. “Is it not just as simple as saying you are only as good as your leader?” Clement asked. “You can put nine men alongside him... Or are we then too easily overlooking the riders who cannot take part?”

Vingegaard does not arrive at the Tour looking short of form. He has already won Paris-Nice, the Volta a Catalunya and the Giro d’Italia this season, making him a far stronger challenger than the compromised rider who tried to take on Pogacar last summer.

Pogacar has also reached July without a major defeat. His season has stretched from the classics to stage-race dominance, and a fifth Tour de France title would move him alongside Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain.

Clement still expects the race to wait for the Alps before the final answer comes. “We can look forward to a beautiful duel, because they have both not lost a big race this season,” Clement said. “I am looking forward to that fight. It would be nice if Pogacar takes his fifth, but I think it will only be decided in the Alps.”

Vingegaard starts that fight without Van Aert, without Laporte and without the most obvious source of last year’s internal Tour debate. He also starts it against the same rider who made Trine’s original demand for a fully yellow-focused Visma look less like a family intervention and more like a question the team still has to answer on the road.