Vingegaard, Ayuso and the storylines to follow at Paris-Nice

What’s eating Jonas Vingegaard? Maybe nothing at all, but the noises haven’t been encouraging in early 2026. A training crash and an unspecified illness saw Vingegaard withdraw from his planned season debut at the UAE Tour, and that relatively routine setback suddenly began to feel like a minor crisis when it emerged that his long-term coach Tim Heemskerk had left the team with immediate effect. Add in Simon Yates’ abrupt retirement in January and it’s been a trying start to the year for Vingegaard and his Visma | Lease a Bike squad.

Vingegaard’s decision to add Paris-Nice to his schedule was a reassuring sign after those waves of bad news, and the Dane will hope to calm the waters around him still further with an assured showing in his seasonal debut.

History isn’t exactly on his side, given that he crashed out of Paris-Nice last year, while he suffered a sound beating against Tadej Pogačar in 2023. On the other hand, Vingegaard is, by a distance, still the best stage race rider in the world after Pogačar, as evidenced by his victory at last year’s Vuelta a España. 

As he builds towards his Giro d’Italia debut, Vingegaard will look to remind everybody of the fact here – himself included, perhaps. It’s a week that could tell us much about his prospects in 2026.

Paul Seixas understandably stole quite a bit of his thunder, but Juan Ayuso looked the part on his Lidl-Trek debut at the Volta ao Algarve, where he landed the overall title after winning the final stage atop the Alto do Malhão. 

The Spaniard’s fractious departure from UAE Team Emirates-XRG came after a mixed final pair of seasons with the squad, which only elevated the pressure on joining his new team. The Tour de France – where Ayuso is targeting a podium spot – will be the true arbiter of his season, but he knows that winning early and often is the best way to assert himself in his new surroundings. 

Ayuso certainly impressed in Portugal, where he seized the initiative on the first summit finish at the Alto da Fóia and then delivered a searing time trial the following day. Perhaps most strikingly, Ayuso evinced a certain disappointment after each stage, his satisfaction at the performance offset by frustration at failing to nab a win.

His ambition for this Paris-Nice is clear, then, and he will relish the chance to measure himself against Vingegaard. Two years ago, Ayuso was a distant second to the Dane at Tirreno-Adriatico. He will expect to be much, much closer this time out.

After enjoying the best season of his career in 2025, Almeida has had a steady start to the new year. He was a distant second behind Remco Evenepoel at the Volta Valenciana, and he had to settle for third on home roads at the Volta ao Algarve. His diesel engine was never particularly suited to the explosive summit finishes there, but his decidedly low-key showing in the stage 3 time trial will surely be a cause for concern.

Even so, Almeida declared himself satisfied with his week’s work, and he will hope his campaign can pick up a bit more momentum at the Race to the Sun, though it’s worth noting that he has tended to be solid rather than unspectacular in March over the years. In 2025, although he did pop up with a stage win at Paris-Nice en route to sixth overall, he only truly hit his stride in April.

We can expect Almeida to follow a similar template here as he builds towards the Giro. He’ll bear in mind that Paris-Nice is a stopover rather than a destination – though it’s also a useful chance to gauge himself against Vingegaard before the main event in May.

The team time trial has become a staple of the Paris-Nice course in recent editions, and this year’s stage is of even greater significance. With the Tour de France set to start with a team time trial for the first time since 1971, squads will be keen to avail of the opportunity to test themselves in the discipline on stage 3 to Pouilly-sur-Loire.

As has been the case since 2023 at Paris-Nice, times will be taken individually at the finish, which means the strongest riders won’t have to temper their efforts in the finale to wait for straggling teammates. Crucially, the Tour’s opening team time trial in Barcelona is also à la Niçoise, so this is a useful dress rehearsal for Vingegaard, Ayuso, Onley et al, even if the hill in the finale of this 23.5km test is nowhere near as sharp as the double haul up Montjuïc in July.

As ever, the team time trial is far from the only eye-catching feature on the Paris-Nice parcours. The rugged opening stage to Carriers-sur-Poissy promises a high-octane start, while stage 6 to Apt has been billed as a dry run for the finale of Milan-San Remo.

The final weekend, meanwhile, features a summit finish at Auron and then a novel final stage, forced upon the organisation after local elections meant the Promenade des Anglais was unavailable. As ever, there’s something for everyone at Paris-Nice.