“It was a massive riding error” – Mads Pedersen blames Victor Campenaerts for crash that ended Jonas Vingegaard’s Tour de France
CyclingTuesday, 21 July 2026 at 20:00
Mads Pedersen has blamed Victor Campenaerts for the crash that ended Jonas Vingegaard’s Tour de France, arguing that the Team Visma | Lease a Bike rider carried responsibility for leading his teammates into the roundabout at excessive speed.
Vingegaard crashed during stage 15 after following the Visma line around the left-hand side of a traffic island. The Dane was taken away by ambulance and later withdrew from the race, ending his challenge to Tadej Pogacar just as the Tour moved into the decisive Alpine stages.
Pogacar subsequently questioned whether Vingegaard’s disrupted sleep following an overnight doping control could have contributed to the incident. Pedersen believes the explanation is considerably more straightforward.
“It was a massive riding error to take that route with far too much speed,” the Lidl-Trek rider said on the Lang Distance podcast.
Pedersen puts responsibility on Campenaerts
Jakob Egholm, Pedersen’s co-host, identified Campenaerts’ approach to the roundabout as the beginning of the crash. The Belgian was leading a line of Visma riders when he followed the race motorbike around the left-hand side of the island rather than taking the more obvious route to the right.
Pedersen did not accept the motorbike’s movement as an excuse. In his view, Campenaerts was responsible for assessing the road himself and choosing a line suitable for the teammates committed to following his wheel.
“When you are the rider leading and you have your entire team on your wheel, you also carry the responsibility, because they are following you,” Pedersen said.
Campenaerts remained upright, but his choice forced the riders behind him into the same approach. Vingegaard then found himself having to tighten his line further as the road curved around the island.
Campenaerts led the Visma team moments before Vingegaard's race-ending crash
Vingegaard’s bike handling could not save him
Pedersen stressed that the crash was not evidence of a weakness in his fellow Dane’s bike handling. “Jonas is unbelievably good technically on the bike,” he said. “But what happened was that he came through the right-hand bend and realised he had to turn even further right to avoid hitting the kerb.”
That late correction left Vingegaard with little room. He went down heavily and was unable to continue his Tour, handing Pogacar an even stronger position at the head of the general classification.
The timing made the abandonment particularly costly. The race had reached terrain on which Vingegaard had been expected to place Pogacar under greater pressure, while Visma had structured its entire Tour around supporting the Dane’s bid for the yellow jersey.
Pedersen’s assessment rejects attempts to trace the crash back to fatigue from the overnight doping control. For the former world champion, Visma’s Tour challenge ended because Campenaerts entered one roundabout too quickly and chose the wrong side while leading his teammates through it.
Kieran WoodDeputy Editor-in-Chief
Kieran Wood is a sports journalist based in Wales and has been active in journalism since 2022. He regularly contributes to DartsNews.com and CyclingUpToDate.com, where he covers professional cycling and darts. In cycling, his work includes liveblogs from major races, including the Tour de France, the Giro d’Italia, and La Vuelta a España, alongside race reports and analysis. He has also conducted interviews with professional riders.
His reporting spans the full racing calendar, from one-day classics to stage races, with a focus on accurate, real-time coverage and clear contextual analysis. For statistics, results, and historical context, he regularly uses resources such as ProCyclingStats. To support reporting on rider activity and training context where relevant, he also references Strava.
In his work, Kieran places strong emphasis on careful sourcing, editorial accuracy, and updating articles as new, verified information becomes available.
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