Whilst Team Visma | Lease a Bike's general classification challenge had already gone more than a little bit pear shaped at the 2024 Tour de Suisse, the dramatic struggles of the team on the shortened stage 6 were notable.
With the stage being reduced to just over 40 kilometres due to bad weather in the region, it was around an hour of relentless, full gas racing for the peloton to deal with, including a sharp and steep climb towards the finish line at the end. The UAE Team Emirates duo of Adam Yates and Joao Almeida again proved themselves the strongest in the field. For Team Visma | Lease a Bike's leaders however, it was a disastrous day.
"With only 42 kilometres, the first 35 of which were downhill and the last 7 steep uphill kilometres, it was a special stage," reflects Team Visma | Lease a Bike sports director, Marc Reef in a post-stage assessment on the team's official website. "The peloton had a flying start, because within about forty minutes they were at the foot of the climb."
That infernal pace didn't really relent once the climbing had begun either. "From there, the pace was immediately high. There wasn't a moment to catch their breath," Reef continues. "Unfortunately, Cian Uijtdebroeks, Wilco Kelderman and Ben Tulett struggled today. They couldn't keep up with the best in the end. We'll see what we can still do in the final part of this Tour de Suisse."
In total, Kelderman lost a further 1:21 on the stage, with the Dutchman now 11th overall at 4:33, Uijtdebroeks lost a massive 3:29 on stage 6, seeing the Belgian drop like a stone from general classification contention, whilst Tulett is now over 15 minutes behind overall leader Adam Yates. With Tour de France spots seemingly up for grabs within Team Visma | Lease a Bike, none of these trio have done much to stake a claim in Switzerland.
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