The five who should help Jonas Vingegaard to the yellow in Paris

There are riders who complete their own honors list and there are riders who have the feeling of victory when they allow others to do so. Nathan Van Hooydonck, nephew of two-time Tour of Flanders winner Edwig Van Hooydonck, mainly drives for Wout van Aert. Last year he did so well in the Gent-Wevelgem classic that winner Van Aert kept saying: ‘This win belongs to both of us.’

This Tour was a copy of the eighth stage. Motivated by the very strong Van Aert, Van Hooydonck worked his way through the seams again and his compatriot completed that work by taking the stage win in Lausanne in the green jersey. ‘The fact that Wout wins here is my reward. That’s why I do it.’

According to the team management, the ‘highly valued and strong team player’ recently signed up. “This is the best team in the world. In this I can become the best version of myself.’ Van Hooydonck came to the team mainly for the classics and to his first Tour for Van Aert’s green jersey ambitions. In the upcoming Pyrenees stages, his task is to drive as far as possible ahead of the remaining five teammates and to drop them as far from the start as possible for the final.

Christophe Laporte proves that performing well in the spring classics increases the chance of a Tour selection. The man from La Seyne-sur-Mer was one of the last to know that he could join his eighth Tour de France. Jumbo-Visma had many candidates for the, as sports director Merijn Zeeman says, ‘expensive places for which they have to fight to show that they are worth that place’.

The new addition to the team has never ridden other grand tours than the Tour. In it he was close to a stage win a few times. He always cycled for Cofidis, but Laporte saw opportunities in Jumbo-Visma to finally win a big race himself between his main task, assisting Van Aert. For example, a race for which the big man turned his nose up, or important classics in which Van Aert was unable to win for whatever reason, think of corona. Laporte didn’t succeed, but he never drove better than in the black and yellow of Jumbo-Visma.

And not just in one-day rates. He also showed himself in small, 8-day rounds that serve as a Tour indicator. Especially in Paris-Nice, in March, Laporte showed to be of great help to the classification men. He then worked for Primoz Roglic, now it will be Vingegaard, as soon as Van Hooydonck sends out.

Tiesj Benoot from Ghent is the third new addition to Jumbo-Visma who has been brought in to give Wout van Aert victories in cycling monuments and with that ‘classic core’ now finds himself in the team that has the greatest chance of winning the Tour de France. Benoot, who comes from DSM and before that worked for Lotto Soudal for a long time, likes ‘the best team I could wish for’. After six months, he signed Jumbo-Visma again until 2025.

Benoot is riding his sixth Tour and once just finished second in a stage in 2019. He is expected to have to get the yellow jersey out of trouble in the mountains, preferably until the penultimate climb, accompanied by Wout van Aert and Sepp Kuss. to keep.

That is comparable to his role in the spring for which he would have been taken on through the intercession of Van Aert. Benoot’s task is to participate in the classics ‘until the finals’. Like Laporte, he had a great preseason with a second place in Dwars door Vlaanderen and third in the Amstel Gold Race.

Benoot is considered one of the best Belgian riders. Pogacar’s UAE would also have been interested. He himself says that he has never started a race with a stronger team than Jumbo-Visma.

So far I was able to drop off teammates on the final climb, said Wout van Aert during the final rest day about the Pyrenees stages on Wednesday and Thursday. ‘After that I can’t follow them anymore, I’m too heavy for that.’ On the other hand: ‘What would be impossible – I can’t go, because too many kilos – is only in the head.’

In that frame of mind, the actually strongest rider of this Tour will sacrifice himself in the coming mountainous midweek. “After that, in the weekend, my own ambitions will be discussed again,” said Van Aert about Saturday’s time trial and the Champs-Elysées sprint on Sunday.

Van Aert indeed performs the impossible: winning stages (two), taking yellow and green, the latter as good as definitive, and then also indispensable in limiting the loss of time of leaders after bad luck and mistakes. Van Aert is everywhere.

In his previous Tour de France, the phenomenon from Herentals already showed this, with the surprise of the stage win in the toughest mountain stage – twice the Mont Ventoux. Agree, which ended with a descent, but it indicates that Van Aert may soon be able to stay with Vingegaard and Kuss longer than what was still in his head during the rest day.

There should have been three of them: Sepp Kuss, Primoz Roglic and Steven Kruijswijk. Three climbers who are getting better in the third week of a Grand Tour and who were in the shape of their lives before the Tour. Things turned out differently: Kuss is probably the only and last teammate who will see jersey wearer Jonas Vingegaard before the Dane has to leave alone to parry yet another attack from Pogacar.

Kuss, from Durango, Colorado, a state with beautiful climbs, is one of the best climbers in the world and indispensable in important mountain stages. Last year he even won one – his most important result to date – because he was allowed to go for his own chances due to the disappearance of all the leaders.

The lightweight helped Roglic to three consecutive Vuelta victories and almost to the Tour win in 2020. For a moment, Kuss didn’t seem so good in the mountains this Tour, but he still reached his own high level at Alpe d’Huez.

“I know I’m always good around this time of year,” he says. “I don’t have to prove anything, so I don’t experience any stress.” He knows he is always good in the second half of the Tour. “So I don’t have to worry about peaking at the right time.”