How Tom Pidcock’s mother indirectly helped Jonas Vingegaard get his deserved Vuelta celebration

Vingegaard celebrated his Vuelta victory on Sunday somewhere in a parking lot. “That was a very special experience. For myself and for the team, but I am very happy that they organized it this way. Unfortunately, we couldn't go to Madrid, but this is also a celebration I won't soon forget.”

That idea was suggested by Tom Pidcock‘s mother and carried out by CEO Richard Plugge and CMO Jasper Saeijs of Visma | Lease a Bike. "They arranged it. We were staying in different hotels, so we had the others come to the parking lot of our hotel. We kept it under the radar so it would remain a kind of secret."

“Of course, it was completely different from the big square in Madrid. At first, I was very disappointed, but in the end, it was a very nice and intimate way to celebrate,” said Vingegaard. “When I heard about it, I thought: nice, but different. In the end, it was much nicer than I could have expected.”

“For once, we were all on the same side: riders, teams, and so on,” continued the Vuelta winner. “In my opinion, it has never been like this before. I have ridden races where the riders were lying on the ground left and right, and 90 percent wanted to stop, but then 10 percent decided to continue. Now everyone was united for the same goal.”

“It doesn't take anything away from my victory,” says Vingegaard. “I am incredibly proud to have won the Vuelta, one of the biggest races on the calendar. It's a shame that it was disrupted in this way in Madrid. Above all, I hope that everyone is okay after those protests, which looked violent. I felt safe the whole time, but I can imagine that wasn't the case for everyone.”

Compared to the Tour de France, even this Vuelta felt like an oasis of calm for Vingegaard, despite all the protests. "There is not nearly as much stress as in the Tour, although I was able to manage my mental fatigue well there this year too. In the Tour, there are 25 TV journalists every day who want something from me, and I know how to deal with that. However, in the Vuelta, there are only two or three. And I have a good bulldog who knows how to take care of things for me," he says with a smile, looking sideways at press officer Emile Vaessen.

Vingegaard seemed to win the Vuelta in a very mature way. “Even if you don't win in cycling, the world goes on. I have that mindset now, whereas before I might have thought about it too much. Before the ride to Bola del Mundo, I realized that I couldn't do any more than my best,” said the leader of Visma | Lease a Bike about the ultimately decisive stage.

What about next year? It is not yet certain that Vingegaard will ride the Giro d'Italia—the last Grand Tour he has yet to win—in 2026. “I've had a demanding year and will definitely ride the Giro at some point, but will that be next year? We don't know yet,” said the Dane, who has only one race day left on his schedule this year. “If I'm selected, the European Championships are on the schedule. But that's up to the national coach,” he says with a wink.

Vingegaard finds it hard to imagine a year without the Tour. "The Tour is the Tour, and that's how the team will look at it. But I'd also love to win all those WorldTour races. Big one-day races? I haven't yet figured out how to perform well in them. It's difficult for me to figure out what to do the day before. I've only won one one-day race, and that was one after the other," he says, referring to the Drome Classic, which follows the Faun-Ardeche Classic.