“It’s a team where there are no other agendas” - Wout van Aert’s absence tipped to give Jonas Vingegaard unexpected Tour de France boost

For years, Team Visma | Lease a Bike have carried one of the most unusual luxuries in the Tour de France peloton. Wout van Aert could chase stages, fight for green, drive a team time trial, police flat days, survive mountain stages and still become one of Jonas Vingegaard’s most important support riders.

That balance has helped define Visma’s best Tour de France years. In 2022, Van Aert won three stages, claimed the green jersey and played a decisive role in Vingegaard’s first yellow jersey victory. He was never simply a domestique, but he was never outside the team’s general classification plan either.

His absence from the 2026 Tour is therefore a major sporting blow. Visma lose one of the most complete riders in the sport and Vingegaard loses a team-mate capable of influencing almost every type of stage.

Yet Eurosport Denmark cycling expert Anders Lund believes the reshaped team may now offer Vingegaard something different: a cleaner hierarchy, with fewer competing demands around the maillot jaune. “He is, on his best days, almost a rider who can make a decisive difference,” Lund said in conversation with Eurosport Denmark.

Van Aert’s value at the Tour has always stretched far beyond stage wins. His ability to work on the flat, survive over climbs and still contest finishes has made him one of the rare riders who could serve several race plans at once.

That is also why his absence cannot be treated as a simple one-for-one selection change. Visma are not just losing horsepower. They are losing a rider who has repeatedly given them tactical reach across the whole race. “He is a huge asset when he is there,” said Lund.

The problem for Visma is Van Aert’s current condition. With the Belgian unable to reach the level required after his elbow injury, Lund sees no reason to question the call to leave him at home. “But that is the point. He is not where he needs to be,” Lund said. “Should you take a man who might be ready, or should you take a fresh man who can do a job? So he is not where he needs to be, and that is why they have chosen to leave him at home.”

A fully fit Van Aert would have been central to the opening team time trial and vital on the nervy flat and transitional days before the high mountains. He would also have given Visma a stage-winning threat in his own right, forcing rival teams to respect more than Vingegaard’s GC ambitions. “When he is dedicated in a support role, then he can help in all terrain. He is a very important person and a very important rider,” Lund said.

The most intriguing consequence is not that Visma suddenly become stronger without Van Aert. They plainly do not. The shift is in the internal shape of the team.

Van Aert’s Tour role has always included space for his own ambitions. He has earned that status through his results, his range and his importance to Visma’s biggest victories. The team have previously managed that balance brilliantly, but it was still a balance. “It is part of his agreement with Visma that he helps, but also gets his own days,” Lund explained.

This year, Vingegaard will not have that dynamic inside the team. Van Aert’s absence removes a superstar, but also removes one of the few riders whose own Tour programme naturally sat alongside the yellow jersey project. “Jonas gets that instead. It is a team where there are no other agendas.”

According to several reports, Ben Tulett and Per Strand Hagenes are expected to take the remaining places in Visma’s Tour selection. Neither brings Van Aert’s status or all-terrain threat, but Lund believes both riders can fit neatly into Vingegaard’s support structure.

“Hagenes can cover some of the same tasks on the flat and in the team time trial. At the same time, Ben Tulett showed really good form in the Dauphine and can become important in the mountains,” he said. “I actually think the team still looks very harmonious.”

Visma’s trade-off is brutal. They lose the rider who can rescue a chaotic stage, win from multiple scenarios and still bury himself for Vingegaard when the Tour reaches its decisive moments.

They may also remove the one delicate question that has followed Van Aert through several Tours: when does the team ride for his chances, and when does every decision bend around yellow?

Lund had no doubt Visma had made the correct decision once Van Aert was below his required level. “I have no doubt that it is the right decision,” he said. “If he is not riding well and cannot meet his own expectations, then he will also become frustrated. That is not good to have on a team. So it is clearly preferable to take a fresh rider rather than a Van Aert who is not ready.”

Van Aert’s absence leaves a huge hole in Visma’s Tour de France line-up. It also leaves Vingegaard’s challenge stripped back to its clearest form: one leader, one objective, and a team built around bringing the yellow jersey back to Denmark.