Pogacar teammate feared major Tour threat from Vingegaard after dominant Giro: 'The best Jonas we've ever seen'

Bjerg raced alongside Vingegaard at the Giro and was particularly struck by how easily his fellow Dane seemed to handle the opposition. He also noticed a more relaxed and confident rider than he had seen in previous years.

Speaking on Eurosport's Radio Tour, Bjerg admitted that Vingegaard appeared to have reached a new level.

"I had a feeling that this was the best Jonas we've ever seen," he said.

Vingegaard was joking around, looked comfortable and seemed to have plenty left in reserve, even while winning stages with relative ease.

The Visma | Lease a Bike rider had every reason to be confident. His Giro campaign produced five stage victories and a commanding overall triumph, finishing more than five minutes ahead of Felix Gall.

The victory also completed a historic collection.

After winning the Tour de France in 2022 and 2023 and the Vuelta a España in 2025, Vingegaard became just the eighth male rider to win all three Grand Tours, joining Jacques Anquetil, Felice Gimondi, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault, Alberto Contador, Vincenzo Nibali and Chris Froome.

His victory in Italy also gave Visma | Lease a Bike reason to believe their decision to include the Giro in his Tour preparation was paying off.

Vingegaard himself sounded confident after the final stage, believing the race had left him in an excellent position for July.

"With the level I showed here in the Giro, I believe I will be in very, very good shape for the Tour de France," he said after securing the pink jersey.

Bjerg certainly expected a close contest in France.

"Going into the Tour, I thought it would be the closest Tour in many years. It didn't quite turn out that way, but I definitely felt he had stepped up a level."

Bjerg was not alone in his assessment. Michael Storer, who finished seventh at the Giro, was equally impressed by Vingegaard's dominance and even backed him to beat Pogačar.

"He could drop us while staying seated," Storer said on the Domestique Hotseat podcast.

"So I would bet on Vingegaard rather than Pogačar for the Tour this year. I'll just put it out there."

Visma had hoped that riding the Giro would give Vingegaard an even bigger engine for the Tour de France. The team had noticed an improvement in his performance during the second Grand Tour of the previous season.

"Last year when Jonas did the Tour and the Vuelta, we saw that his level was improving slightly in the second Grand Tour, so that was an extra reason to go for it this year," sports director Marc Reef told Domestique ahead of the Giro.

By stage 15, however, Vingegaard was already more than four minutes behind Pogačar. His race then ended when a crash left him with a fractured collarbone.

Afterwards, questions emerged about whether riding the Giro had been the ideal preparation for taking on the Slovenian.

Vingegaard himself acknowledged that the approach may have left him lacking the explosiveness needed to respond to his rival.

"It's clear that it's difficult to ride the Giro and then suddenly become explosive," he told TV2.

The 2027 Tour de France route presents another challenge for Vingegaard, with 71 kilometres of individual time trials and just three summit finishes. Visma's Head of Racing Marc Reef admitted he would have preferred more mountain finishes.

"Compared to last year, I count fewer summit finishes, and in my opinion, there could have been more," Reef said after the route presentation.

Whether Vingegaard will return to the Giro before tackling the Tour remains undecided. Team boss Richard Plugge admitted that his crash in July had left Visma without crucial information about the effectiveness of their approach.

"To do a proper analysis, it's more or less difficult because we missed, let's say, from stage 15 onwards, we missed some data," Plugge told TV2.

Whether Visma can turn the Vingegaard who impressed Bjerg so much in Italy into a genuine threat to Pogačar in July remains the unanswered question.