The Giro d’Italia 2026 has become Jonas Vingegaard’s very personal playground, who will carry the Maglia Rosa seemingly effortlessly to the finish in Rome. But will this form be enough in a few weeks when we face Tadej Pogacar at the Tour de France? There are different views on this in the peloton.
Jonas Vingegaard didn’t always set off cycling fireworks at the Giro d’Italia 2026, but at the end of the day he was by far the strongest rider of all. The Visma captain’s recipe for success was cool, controlled and successful. As soon as he has overcome the small stumbling block on the 20th stage, the Dane can look forward to his triumphant journey to Rome.
The scene inevitably turns to the Tour de France, when the seemingly invincible final opponent awaits Vingegaard: Tadej Pogacar. The big question that arose during the tour of Italy: Is this Vingegaard strong enough to overthrow the Dominator from his throne? The Giro peloton isn’t so sure.
“Tadej is from another planet”
Wout Poels is firmly convinced that the Dane will again lose out in the duel with the Slovenian. He could only take his hat off to Vingegaard’s appearance at the Giro, “but Tadej is simply from another planet. We’ll see that on the Tour,” he told “CyclingPro.net”. Maybe, says Poels, “Tadej is quite happy that Jonas is here and has already got this race under his belt.”
Jayco AlUla driver Ben O’Connor sees it a little differently and also believes Vingegaard can pull off the Tour coup. However, he also pointed out that the Giro is not as demanding as the Tour.
“The tour is harder, to be honest. I remember last year when I was pretty exhausted after the first ten days. Here [beim Giro] it is different. But of course it works [für Vingegaard] good enough. There is no doubt about that. I don’t doubt that he either [bei der Frankreich-Rundfahrt] will be at the forefront.”
Egan Bernal, who won the Tour in 2019 and the Giro two years later, has a similar opinion. He said of Vingegaard: “He is one of the best drivers in history. I think he can do it [im Duell mit Pogacar] beat very well. He shows us in this race that he is on another level. He’s a few steps ahead of us.”
