"Who's Bjarne Riis?” – Plugge hits back at criticism of Visma and Vingegaard

As the Tour de France enters its decisive final week, Team Visma | Lease a Bike finds itself in an unwanted position, chasing. Jonas Vingegaard is still second overall, but Tadej Pogacar has a firm grip on yellow, having taken four stage wins and built a commanding lead. The scenario has led to public criticism of Visma’s approach, most notably from former Tour winner Bjarne Riis, who even suggested Vingegaard consider leaving the team. Team boss Richard Plugge isn’t too impressed by those comments.

“Who's Bjarne Riis? He's somewhere in Denmark watching from a distance,” Plugge told AD, brushing off the comments. “I'm used to everyone being involved with us. Some people think what we do is fantastic, others think it's absolutely awful.”

Still, he’s not blind to the reality. “It can always be better,” he admitted. “We're mainly focused on improving with our experts. We could write the most critical columns about ourselves. About what? I'm not going to tell you.”

Visma isn’t without results this Tour, Simon Yates delivered a stage win and Vingegaard remains Pogacar’s closest rival. “We've been on the podium in every Tour since 2019. For now, we're second in the Tour and Pogacar's biggest challenger. And we also won a stage with Simon Yates.”

Plugge knows the gap is larger than planned, but says there’s no panic. “We know Pogacar is the best rider in the world. Jonas has lost twice as much time as we anticipated. That's why we're two minutes further behind than expected. But there's still a lot to come, and Jonas is feeling good.”