"It was a huge boost for us and Jonas" - Visma DS Zeeman on team's motivation and tactics for Col du Galibier stage

Team Visma | Lease a Bike are on sky high motivation. After having months of doubts on Jonas Vingegaard's form, several riders sidelined from the Tour de France due to injuries and even several crashes in the opening two days of the race; Vingegaard matched Tadej Pogacar's stinging attack on the Madonna di San Luca and proved he is ready to fight for a third Tour win. The team is now somewhat on the upper foot and the Dane is likely to just try and follow Pogacar once again up this Tuesday's high-mountain stage.

"I think it will be super fast on the Galibier. Then it’s not so much down to tactics for us, it’s just to try to follow and see who will be first on top and if a small group forms before the descent to Valloire," team DS Merijn Zeeman told CyclingWeekly. "Yesterday was above expectations, so hopefully we can see more in the high mountains. Tomorrow we will get another answer on Jonas’ shape I would say."

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Talking at the start of stage 3, it was evident that the team had a big weight of it's shoulders solely from the understanding that the Dane had trained back to his best form. Throughout the two days the team was flawless when it came to positioning and Vingegaard has not lost a single second to his rivals yet; whilst gaining time on the likes of Primoz Roglic and Carlos Rodríguez. Today on the fourth day of the Tour we have a very different challenge: with long climbs, high altitude and cold weather all featured on the mythical Col du Galibier.

"There’s always on the first mountain stage some GC guys cracking. Maybe they can come back in the last week, but tomorrow there will be hard racing," Zeeman assures. "All the guys need to deliver, but I'm sure some of the guys will have a very hard day. It's been a strange start to the Tour. Now what we had this weekend with the heat then Valloire will be much colder, with far longer efforts as well."

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But above all, Zeeman congratulates the team's staff for the work they have done with the defending champion in order to complete the recovery in an ideal way: "It gave a huge boost to the team. If you can see him performing well it makes everyone very happy. We have very very good coaches. I think Tim Heemskerk, his performance coach, did a super super job. "

"Of course it's the commitment of Jonas and that he put everything to one side to be here so he deserves the most credit. But I think Tim, Martijn Redegeld, Mathieu Heijboer and all the guys that did the rehab with him deserve a lot of credit as they did a fantastic job. It gives the team a lot of confidence. It was a huge boost for us and Jonas," he concluded.

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🇫🇷 #TDF2024 Jonas is still in the same time as the leader! ✌🏼

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