"It clearly wasn't enough" - Jonas Vingegaard bashed by compatriot Bryan Nygaard

Jonas Vingegaard has now finished five consecutive editions of the Tour de France in the podium, every single one that he has started. The Danish climber would've likely become an absolutely historical figure in the race if only there wasn't a Tadej Pogacar that has achieved the exact same over the past six years - on three occasions, directly ahead of Vingegaard.

"It's now 4-2 for Pogacar. Before the Tour, I already posed the question: is Vingegaard a secondary figure in the Pogacar era, if he can't compete with Pogacar again? I think we can now say that's the case," Bryan Nygaard argued in The Cycling Podcast. "He couldn't offer Pogacar any competition."

"He's won the Tour twice and is the only one who can challenge Pogacar in the Grand Tours. So he has to be the best version of himself. But I have a feeling he probably didn't get the best out of himself. That was my feeling when I read his wife's interview, saying he should skip the altitude training camp, that he was away from home too much, that he should spend time renovating the kitchen… He says he did everything he could, but if that's the case, it clearly wasn't enough."

Nygaard, a former manager of many top teams in the World Tour, isn't too fond of the planning and tactics that Visma had throughout the year for the climber, which resulted in a second place in the overall classification behind Pogacar.

"And maybe he should do other things. I'm not saying he should become a plumber, but maybe he should set different goals. And I'll say it again: he needs to spend more time on the bike with a number on his back. Race more. That way you win more races, especially when Pogacar isn't there".

Vingegaard won the Volta ao Algarve and then crashed at Paris-Nice, ending his spring campaign after a concussion saw him requiring extended period of recovery over 10 days of little movement. He resumed racing at the Criterium du Dauphiné where he was again below Pogacar, but quite above the rest of the competition. That is exactly what happened at the Tour one month later, with the same riders taking up the exact same order on the podium.

"They made the race hard in the first part of the Tour. But when you start a rider like Jonas Vingegaard, who has twelve to fourteen days of racing under his belt since August of last year, I think he'll get tired," Nygaard argued, although it was clearly Pogacar who displayed the signs of fatigue. "I'm not a sports scientist, but when you start the second part of the race with so little racing rhythm – where you have to be the best version of yourself and race against the strongest rider of all time – I don't understand it."

"It depends on Pogacar's motivation, and that's beyond his control. Vingegaard is at a point where, if he wins the Vuelta, he has to ask himself if he should perhaps go for the Giro next year. Even if he wins those races, it's a kind of defeatism. It shows that you can't win the Tour if Pogacar is competing."

Nygaard also argues that Vingegaard performs better in the final week of Grand Tours. "That's a myth. A myth that the Danes especially like to hear. They always say Vingegaard is better in the third week and on the longer climbs. But going into this Tour, it had been a long time since he'd been the better rider in the third week. It's a myth that needed to be deconstructed to see what Vingegaard is actually capable of in Pogcaar's presence."

However what the Dane really is arguing is that Vingegaard isn't stronger than Pogacar in the final week of Grand Tours: "Against other riders, he's certainly better on long climbs and in the third week, but when Pogacar is there and in form, Pogacar has no weakness whatsoever. He has no disadvantage compared to Vingegaard. Not on long climbs, not on short climbs, not in the second, third, or – if there was one – fourth week. No matter how much the Danes would like that".

Now with only a Volta ao Algarve GC win in his palmarès this year, the Team Visma | Lease a Bike rider is going to the Vuelta a España as the man to beat and with with some pressure to be the best in Spain.

"He has something to make up for. If he had won the Tour, he probably would have canceled the Vuelta as well. He tends not to race too much. I expect him to destroy everyone. The more he races, the stronger he'll be. With the Tour behind him and the fitness he built up there... That supports my earlier point. I don't think he finished the Tour tired; I think he finished it incredibly strong. Mentally, he's where he needs to be. He knows himself very well and knows where he stands now. I think he'll have very little competition in the Vuelta."