“Variation is also important in a career every now and then” – Benoot reveals why he is training separately from Vingegaard and Visma ahead of Tour de France

While the rest of Team Visma | Lease a Bike are gathered at their high-altitude training camp in Tignes, one key Tour de France selection is notably absent: Tiesj Benoot. The 31-year-old Belgian is taking a different approach in 2025, racing the Tour de Suisse and skipping the Tignes camp for now. It’s a calculated choice, one rooted in both performance science, but perhaps more so in personal balance.

“I've done the classics – Sierra Nevada – Dauphiné – Tignes and then the Tour – three years in a row now, so I wanted something different,” Benoot told In de Leiderstrui. That request was granted, and while his teammates climbed the Alps or took recovery blocks after the Giro or Dauphiné, Benoot raced on Swiss roads, his eyes still firmly on July.

Benoot isn’t taking a shortcut. His foundation was built with a brutal four-week altitude camp in Sierra Nevada, matching the volume of riders like Otto Vergaerde and Lidl-Trek’s Jasper Stuyven. But unlike his teammates now at Tignes, Benoot is leaning into variation. “I have the feeling that a new stimulus every now and then is also just good,” he said. “Variation is also important in a career every now and then, both physically and mentally.”

The mental angle matters. As a father of two young children, Benoot opted to combine elite training with family time, even bringing his family to Spain for the final week of Sierra Nevada. He spoke candidly about the decision: “I was able to train very well on the Sierra Nevada and my family also came over for the fourth week, so that was great.”

This is also important for Benoot’s teammate Jonas Vingegaard, who regularly adapts his training schedule and racing program in order to spend as little time away from his family as possible.

His current Tour de Suisse programme isn’t just for race rhythm; it fills a practical gap. “Because you go a bit longer (at altitude), you can also build up more slowly,” he explained. “And I trained a bit harder in the fourth week, because I realized that I don't have that training period after the Tour of Switzerland anymore. Which I would normally have after the Dauphiné.”

For Benoot, the shift isn’t guesswork. It’s rooted in past experience. “I followed the same approach in 2019 and I rode a pretty good Tour, so I believe in it.”

Benoot has almost solely ridden the classics in the spring, and then the Tour throughout his career. He has never ridden the Giro, and only once the Vuelta, all the way back in 2018. Along the way he has won races like Strade Bianche, and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne, but never a Tour stage.

He’s also keeping a realistic eye on the broader Tour picture. Watching Visma’s Dauphiné squad from afar, he was both impressed and reflective, especially considering the level of Tadej Pogacar. “It was impressive again, how fast they ride,” he said of the time trial. But he acknowledged recent setbacks: “We would have liked to see it differently in the last two days. On the other hand, the Tour is still relatively far away and we just have to keep doing what we are doing.”

Benoot will return to Belgium after the Tour de Suisse, racing the national championships instead of seeking more altitude. It’s another deviation from the typical Tour prep playbook, but one that reflects a more mature understanding of what he needs. “If you want to be good one week earlier, you also have to start training again one week earlier,” he reasoned. “Everything is then a bit more glued together.”