Matteo Jorgenson and Sepp Kuss lead Team Visma | Lease a Bike in Jonas Vingegaard's absence at Critérium du Dauphiné

With Team Visma | Lease a Bike having secured overall victory at each of the last two Critérium du Dauphiné's, this time around the general classification hopes of the team will rest on the shoulders of Sepp Kuss and Matteo Jorgenson.

"We're going into this race with GC ambitions for myself and Sepp," Jorgenson previews optimistically in a press release to the team's official website. "We start with seven strong riders, most of whom have ridden together recently in preparation for the Tour. The competition is very strong with riders like Primoz Roglic, Remco Evenepoel and Juan Ayuso. The level will undoubtedly be high, but that will only be good after the last training block."

Jorgenson took victory at Paris-Nice earlier this year, with Kuss of course becoming a Grand Tour winner at the Vuelta a Espana in 2023 give the team two viable GC threats. Sadly though, there will be no Jonas Vingegaard with the Dane still not considered fit enough after his crash at the Itzulia Basque Country. With the reigning Maillot Jaune facing a race against time to be fit for the Tour de France, both Kuss and Jorgenson have a chance to prove themselves as a potential replacement.

"We're going into this race with high expectations, but we also know that we won't be at our best until the Tour de France in about four weeks," sports director Frans Maassen says. "As a team management, we are curious to see how things go with the guys riding the Tour. We still don't know exactly which riders will be in the squad because we don't know if Jonas Vingegaard and Wout van Aert will be fit again. We have to wait and see. We just want to do as well as we can in this race. It's a race we'll have fond memories of."

Sepp Kuss
Matteo Jorgenson
Dylan van Baarle
Steven Kruijswijk
Tiesj Benoot
Bart Lemmen
Koen Bouwman