Trine Vingegaard urges cycling to rethink demands placed on its biggest stars

Trine Vingegaard Hansen has renewed her call for professional cycling to modernise, arguing that teams should make greater use of technology and tailor their programmes more closely to individual riders.

Speaking to Viaplay in the family’s home town of Glyngøre during the Tour of Denmark, she addressed the reaction to an interview she gave last year about the physical and mental demands placed on her husband, two time Tour de France winner Jonas Vingegaard.

Her comments prompted widespread debate after she raised concerns about the relentless schedule of training camps, races and international travel. According to Vingegaard, however, much of the discussion missed the point.

“I think people misunderstood that interview,” she told Viaplay. “It is fundamentally about Jonas being an introvert and hating all the days spent travelling. It is not about him having to be at home with his family.”

She believes teams should explore alternatives to traditional altitude camps, which can require riders to spend several weeks away from home before travelling directly to races or further training blocks.

Altitude rooms and other controlled training environments, she argued, could offer similar benefits while reducing travel and the stress of constantly moving between locations.

“You can use an altitude room, set it to 3,000 metres and stay at home,” she said. “That means avoiding the travelling and the stress. It is about using the technology that is already available in a more intelligent way.”

Her criticism reflects a wider frustration with what she sees as a conservative culture within professional cycling. While teams have embraced developments in aerodynamics, nutrition and race strategy, she believes the sport has been slower to rethink how riders live and work throughout the season.

“I think it is a deeply old fashioned industry,” she said. “You have to look at the individual and consider how technology from other industries can be used intelligently.”

For Vingegaard, the issue goes far beyond race results. She described a rider who often reaches the end of a long season exhausted and struggles to look far into the future.

“He [Jonas] loves racing his bike, but he also has to thrive in life,” she said. “Training should not feel miserable during the other 250 days of the year. That is where it matters that he enjoys what he is doing.”

Visma | Lease a Bike has already acted on some of those concerns. The team adjusted Vingegaard’s programme for 2026 and plans to discuss further changes with him ahead of the 2027 season. 

Trine’s criticism, however, extends beyond one team. She believes cycling organisations need to recruit more people from outside the sport and bring in different perspectives.

“If you keep hiring former professional cyclists, nothing changes,” she said. “Things continue to be done in the same way because that is how they have always been done. But the world is developing, and cycling has to develop with it.”

For Trine Vingegaard, the issue is not a choice between family life and elite sport. It is whether riders can compete at the highest level without the demands around racing eventually wearing them down.

“As long as he is happy, I do not care which races he rides,” she said. “They are his dreams. I will support him completely.”