"You're going to spend a lot of time with me" - Jonas Vingegaard is hand-picking Victor Campenaerts as 2026 right-hand man

Team Visma | Lease a Bike had in Victor Campenaerts perhaps its best signing of 2025 - alongside, of course, Giro d'Italia winner Simon Yates. But the Belgian, besides evolving substantially and thriving in his new domestique role, has quickly put himself deep in the Jonas Vingegaard block, and in 2026 the Dane has already expressed having Campenaerts racing with him as a priority.

"Is there rivalry or competition between UAE and Visma | Lease a Bike? Yes, for sure. But I can also say we actually have a very good relationship. One of my better friends in and outside of cycling is Tim Wellens (UAE rider, ed.)," Campenaerts said in the Domestique Hotseat Podcast. "He is a little bit more of a winner himself than I am, but in the Tour, we do a similar job. And of course, we ride elbow to elbow, and we don’t give presents to each other in the race".

UAE and Visma are the two teams who dominate the current Grand Tour field, and their riders have finished first and second in every single three-week race in 2025. Hence, their main riders often find themselves going head to head, and the same applies to their domestiques who spend long kilometers in the head of the peloton battling for positioning. This can often get tense, specially for a rider like Campenaerts who has to bring his leaders to the front when it's dangerous.

And he thrived in this position, without really being criticized for aggressive behaviour to obtain the position. "In no way do those accusations really come to us, and we don’t have the feeling that other riders aren’t respecting us,” the Belgian explains explains. "Cycling is a big boys' game. We're not asking politely to take the front, you just take the front, and it is what it is. You put your balls on the table, and in the end it’s the big boys riding on the front, and you don’t hit the front by coincidence.”

Campenaerts rode Paris-Nice and already there he was tasked with protecting the Dane, which happened until he abadoned the race on stage 6. But then followed the Tour de France training camps, the Criterium du Dauphiné, the Tour itself - and after all of that, the Belgian himself volunteered to race the Vuelta a España where he helped VIngegaard to overall victory. High level, consistency and his daily vlogs were also a boost in mood in the very stressful environment the Dutch team faces. It became a perfect atch.

"I went to the Tour de France with only one goal and that was helping Jonas win the Tour de France". Campenaerts did a great job at the Tour, thriving in the mountains, and being a perfect road captain in the flat and hilly stages. But against a generational rider such as Pogacar, it wasn't enough. "We can honestly say that Tadej was stronger this Tour de France than Jonas. But we tried whatever we know. We had to come up with surprises or unexpected initiatives to try and win the race". 

Campenaerts' relationship with Vingegaard grew, and he admits that the two will continue to race together a lot soon. "We were at the dining table yesterday, and he emphasized really with a big underline how happy he is about my work. He said, 'I don't know my program for next year, but I know what your program will be because you're going to spend a lot of time with me.'"

Where do his personal ambitions stand then, at the time being? "Of course, if I can win five stages in the Tour, I would be happy. But the difference between one and five is not that big. The difference between zero and one, that's a big difference. Winning in the Tour is forever," he concluded.