Visma | Lease a Bike hits back at Pogacar: ‘It’s nice that he doesn’t get it’

The Tour de France is hotting up in every way. Not only are the riders set to endure 30º temperatures for today’s race to Mûr de Bretagne, with red hot racing almost guaranteed, but the war of words is becoming too hot to handle as well.

This morning Visma | Lease a Bike’s head of sport Grischa Niermann responded to Tadej Pogačar’s criticism of their tactics, telling the gathered press, “It’s a good thing he doesn’t get it. We followed our own strategy and did exactly what we set out to do. Period.”

Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) had been well up the road in a breakaway during Thursday’s stage, and it was expected the Dutchman would reclaim the race leader’s yellow jersey. However, that was threatened when Visma | Lease a Bike upped the pace in the closing kilometres. In the end Van der Poel took yellow by a single second, relegating Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) to second place, albeit probably temporarily.

Afterwards Pogačar questioned the Dutch team’s tactics, saying they were rubbish and suggesting they wanted to keep him yellow. 

This morning Niermann fought back.

“Did we want him in yellow? Absolutely not. I think UAE rode until six kilometres from the finial and they set the lead, so they also decided to keep Pogačar in yellow. What doo I think of the criticism? I think it’s a compliment that he’s interfering with us. We look at ourselves, determine out own tactics and we don’t interfere,” the German concluded.

Visma’s leader, Jonas Vingegaard is seen as the only real challenger to Pogačar’s crown but the Dane lost time on Wednesday’s time trial, losing well over a minute to the Slovenian, and he now sits fifth overall, 1.13 behind his rival.

Friday’s stage to 197km Mûr de Bretagne takes in two ascents of the fabled climb and is likely to see more aggressive, entertaining racing. And maybe some interesting tactics.