Jonas Vingegaard would prefer Giro win over Tour de France in 2026

Jonas Vingegaard has opened the door further to a possible Giro d’Italia debut in 2026, indicating that he would place completing a full set of Grand Tour victories above winning another Tour de France.

The Dane won the Vuelta a España in September, adding the title to the Tours he won in 2022 and 2023. Vingegaard had considered racing the Giro in 2025, but he ultimately decided against the corsa rosa to focus on the Tour, where he again placed second overall to Tadej Pogacar.

“Win the three Grand Tours or the Tour de France in 2026? I think I’d prefer to win the three Grand Tours…” Vingegaard told La Dernière Heure. “And after the Tour de France and the Vuelta, I only have the Giro left…”

Vingegaard added, however, that the Tour is likely to remain on his schedule even if he does opt to make his Giro debut. 

“We haven’t decided yet where I’ll race next season,” Vingegaard said. “The Tour de France obviously remains the big objective.”

Speaking to Domestique last month, Visma | Lease a Bike sports director Grischa Niermann acknowledged that discussions would be held on Vingegaard’s possible participation at the Giro, but he added that nothing was yet set in stone.

“It’s no secret that Jonas said he could imagine doing both, and that’s certainly something we are looking into now, but there’s no decision taken yet. Up to now, we don’t know anything at all about the parcours of the Giro, so it’s hard to take a decision,” Niermann said. 

“It is certainly on his list that he would really like to win all three Grand Tours in his career, so it will happen somewhere – but I cannot guarantee you if it happens next year.”

In 2024, Pogacar became the first rider since Marco Pantani in 1998 to win the Giro and Tour in the same season. That campaign also marked a change in the dynamic of the Pogacar-Vingegaard rivalry. After two heavy defeats to Vingegaard at the previous two Tours, Pogacar hit back with a dominant triumph in 2024. He hammered home his superiority once again at this year’s Tour, beating Vingegaard into second place for the third time since their rivalry began in 2021.

“Sometimes Pogačar seems really unbeatable,” Vingegaard told La Dernière Heure. “He is undeniably the best rider in the world right now. But if I told myself he couldn’t be beaten, it would mean I was giving up. So I won’t do that.”

Vingegaard suffered a career-threatening crash at Itzulia Basque Country in 2024, and although he recovered to place on the Tour podium that July, he said that he had only returned to his old level towards the end of this season.

“You never really know when you have a bad crash like that if you will get back to the same level you had before,” Vingegaard said at the Saitama Criterium this weekend, according to AFP. “It was only by the end of this year that I could see that I was able to push in the same way that I was before my crash.”

Vingegaard was first across the line at the Saitama Criterium on Sunday, despite an early crash.