OFFICIAL: Jonas Vingegaard headlines stacked Team Visma | Lease a Bike squad for Giro d’Italia
Cycling
Team Visma | Lease a Bike have officially confirmed their lineup for the 2026 Giro d’Italia, with Jonas Vingegaard arriving at the race backed by one of the strongest squads in the peloton.
At a time when several of the Dane’s expected Maglia Rosa rivals have already disappeared from the start list, Visma’s selection only reinforces the sense that the two-time Tour de France winner will begin the race as the overwhelming favourite for the pink jersey.
Sepp Kuss and Wilco Kelderman strengthen mountain core
The headline support names are immediately eye-catching. Sepp Kuss and Wilco Kelderman bring extensive Grand Tour experience and climbing depth, giving Visma a proven mountain structure around their leader. Kuss returns to a full support role after his own Grand Tour success in recent seasons, while Kelderman adds another experienced presence capable of surviving deep into major mountain stages.
Alongside them, Victor Campenaerts offers a very different weapon. The Belgian’s engine and breakaway strength could become particularly important on transitional stages and in the increasingly tactical finales expected at this year’s Giro.
Piganzoli adds intriguing Italian storyline
There is also significant interest around the inclusion of Davide Piganzoli, one of Italy’s most promising young stage race talents. The 2026 Giro offers Piganzoli the opportunity to race his home Grand Tour alongside the strongest general classification rider in the field, while also gaining experience inside a full Grand Tour control structure.
Elsewhere, Bart Lemmen, Timo Kielich and Tim Rex round out a squad built to function across all terrain, from the opening stages in Bulgaria through to the high mountains of the final week.
Timo Kielich rides his first Grand Tour for Visma
Vingegaard’s rivals continue to disappear
The lineup announcement also lands in the context of an increasingly weakened Giro field. Joao Almeida, widely viewed as one of Vingegaard’s biggest expected challengers, has already withdrawn through illness. Mikel Landa was ruled out following his crash at Itzulia Basque Country, while former Maglia Rosa winner Richard Carapaz has now also confirmed he will miss the race after a delayed recovery from surgery.
Against that backdrop, Visma’s approach to the race appears increasingly straightforward. This is not an experimental Giro lineup or a reduced Grand Tour support group built around survival. It is a squad assembled to control the race.
Chasing cycling history
For Vingegaard himself, the Giro represents an opportunity to move one step closer to cycling history. Already a two-time Tour de France winner and Vuelta a Espana champion, the Dane is now targeting the only Grand Tour missing from his palmarès. Victory in Rome would make him just the eighth rider to win all three Grand Tours.
With a stacked support squad around him and several key rivals already gone before the race has even begun, the pressure and expectation surrounding Visma’s Giro campaign have only grown stronger.
Read also
Team Visma | Lease a Bike for the 2026 Giro d'Italia
| Rider |
| Victor Campenaerts |
| Davide Piganzoli |
| Sepp Kuss |
| Timo Kielich |
| Bart Lemmen |
| Wilco Kelderman |
| Tim Rex |
| Jonas Vingegaard |
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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- Ok, Walt 🤣... Vingegaard would be lucky to get on the poduim. He would not beat Seixas or Del Toro, let alone TP. Then there are the Americans...BD06-11-2026
- So, for starters. Cycling is a saturated, static/dying sport in traditional lands, it will not have resurgences like eg running occasionally does because of several obstacular (yes, I know that’s not a word but don’t make me point out the obvious at your expense) factors. Obviously, like almost everything involving money, there is a desire/need/advantage to growth and that can only come from (developing or just testing) new markets. For me, the WC is the obvious and best choice for several reasons, it comes at the end of the season so is less critical season risk wise, it is not a “pro” team race but nation based which makes integration of uncommon participation more natural. It is a vehicle for redistribution (one of a very limited number of available mechanisms to develop new markers fairly) that the fixed calendar doesn’t allow and it helps make budgets fairer over the long run (moving the whole circus to everywhere evens out everyone’s budget as opposed to having everyone always come to the same location.Jumpyjohn06-11-2026
- Sad that a more refreshing article like this, which could generate discussion in a number of directions, gets completely ignored for the importance of debating the level of superiority of one rider into every single last detail, including a majority of totally hypothetical ones. People complain there is no news in the off season and it’s boring but don’t realise how boring it is to review the same old discussion over and over again, several times a day. In fact, you’d almost think this was a rider fan website. Instead of complaining about the FREE (as long as you pay attention to data use if not unlimited coz this site consumes almost as much for loading Youtube) content, the presence of cv of authors (for the missed obvious reason that it makes it easier to insert extra advertising without changing formats), the lack of quality/checking and depth of articles, why not also think about the content, quality and variety of posts that everyone can contribute to? The platform becomes irrelevant when discussion is interesting.Jumpyjohn06-11-2026
- UAE Team Emirates and Pogačar will officially unveil their objectives at the team’s media day, which will take place on December 18 in Benidorm, Spain. New information from the UAE Team: Exceptional recovery remains the cornerstone of success for the Slovenian cannibal-Pogi, whose sporting manager, Matxin, believes he will be even better in 2027 than he has been over the past three seasons.PogiSloFans06-11-2026
- Yeh, but he didn't and RE beat Pog & Del T 👍
leedorney06-11-2026 - Just my opinionleedorney06-11-2026
- Great win.However will the world champions jersey be simply a domestic for the season which will some what tarnish the jersey. I hope he is given free rein to try and win some races.paultryan200206-11-2026
- Gretsky wow how old are you lol. Classy sportman though.🤣🤣🤣🤣 Hope it is a good as the one they made on Mark Cavendish.paultryan200206-11-2026
- Literally the perfect RedBull athlete.anonymouscyclist06-11-2026
- And well understood in the CX community.anonymouscyclist06-11-2026
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