Richard Plugge slams new 2026 Tour de France experiment: "I’m not a fan of that idea"

The 2026 Tour route for the men in a nutshell: kicking off with a team time trial and a punchy stage on Montjuic, a leisurely passage through the Pyrenees, a reasonable transition from west to east, a tough passage through the Vosges, and then an alpine dessert with a double finish on Alpe d'Huez.

“The focus is at the end,” is Plugge's initial analysis as CEO of Visma | Lease a Bike. “The start of the Tour is relatively easier: they clearly want the battle to last until the end,” he says.

The A.S.O. does not do anything really crazy – read: gravel or cobblestones, which Plugge is strongly opposed to in a Grand Tour. Nevertheless, the Dutchman has some reservations about the format of the "team time trial" on day one, with Montjuic as the finale.

“I'm not in favor of that,” says Plugge. “It takes away the ‘team’ aspect. A team time trial is a team time trial, and what makes it so great is that the time of the number four or five counts, so you have to take them with you to the finish. That's what I like about it, but it is what it is, and we have to adapt to it.”

“This isn't really a team time trial,” he repeats. It's more like a long lead-out for the leader. We have to see how we're going to respond to that. Usually, a team time trial suits us. What's the idea? No idea... maybe to do something different for a change? But then don't call it a team time trial; call it a lead-out —a team lead-out trial, or something like that. TLT', he smiles at his own search for a name for the discipline.

Still, there is a positive aspect to the opening weekend in Barcelona. “With that team time trial at the start, you immediately set something in motion, and that creates a kind of calm in the peloton. If the sprinters can go for the yellow jersey, you often get a lot of commotion, which is logical. Now there will already be differences with sprinters.”

Plugge confirms that Jonas Vingegaard and Visma | Lease a Bike want to go for the yellow jersey again and fight for it until the end. On the Dutch mountain, that is. “Alpe d’Huez is always beautiful, and via the Col de Sarenne is very beautiful. And even tougher, I think. I like that. It’s going to be a brutal stage anyway, which is cool. Especially with the Sarenne.”