Visma | Lease a Bike counting on Jorgenson for GC push: "He has already exceeded our expectations"

The German ex-rider, who competed in the Tour nine times, understands the stakes. "Everyone wanted to ride the Tour back then, but it's a kind of love-hate relationship. It's incredibly tough, but the stakes are also very high. For our team, it's the most important race of the year, which makes it exciting to be in the team car."

"We’ve had a lot of bad luck," Niermann says, referring to injuries, including those of Jonas Vingegaard and Wout van Aert, who will be at the Tour’s start in Florence. "Meanwhile, we’ve achieved great performances with Olav Kooij in the Giro and Matteo Jorgenson in the Dauphiné. Still, there's a contrast to last year when everything seemed to be going well. It feels different this way."

"At some point, the bad luck has to stop," continues Niermann. "It may sound harsh, but in some way, it's part of it, and you have to keep going. We've already proven we can do that with riders like Matteo. He showed the spirit in Dwars door Vlaanderen, after Wout’s crash, and in the Dauphiné."

In the Tour, they want to show the team’s resilience. "Given the circumstances, Jonas is doing very well, but he’s still dealing with the aftermath of his crash. We don’t know exactly how competitive he will be, but four weeks ago, we couldn’t have dreamed that both he and Wout would be in such good shape. Our dream is still to win the Tour, but we can’t call it a goal. It’s different from the last two years."

And the Tour dream for Van Aert? "He’s here hopefully for stage wins, but he’s had to recover for a long time and will need to grow," says Niermann, who also explains the ambitions with Jorgenson for this Tour. "He has already exceeded our expectations and is again very well prepared, so he will play an important role. He has never aimed for a general classification in a grand tour, but hopefully, he can stay with Jonas as long as possible and thus defend his position."

"We expect UAE Team Emirates and Tadej Pogacar to test us directly," says the team leader of Visma | Lease a Bike. "These first two days suit him very well."