Tour winner Jonas Vingegaard and his team are cycling's new dominators. As always, there is doubt, but Jumbo-Visma doesn't feel like discussing doping. In addition, there are certainly other explanations for dominance than the use of prohibited means.
In the evening sun in Paris, Jonas Vingegaard proudly sang the Danish national anthem, kissed his daughter Frida on the cheek and then gave an emotional speech: On the podium of the Tour de France, he thanked each and every one of his teammates in a remarkably detailed manner. The new tour dominator knew what was right. In the past three weeks, his team had played an immense part in the shy 25-year-old's greatest career success to date.
The Jumbo-Visma team performed with an almost outrageous dominance at the Tour of France 2022. Six stage victories, green jersey, mountain jersey, plus Vingegaard's sovereign tour victory with a lead of almost three minutes over defending champion Tadej Pogacar: The track record of the Dutch team reads as impressive as possible. But when it comes to such achievements, doubts always come along - especially in cycling with its deeply inglorious past.
Unsurprisingly, at Jumbo-Visma they don't feel like such discussions: "It's such a shitty question - it comes up every year, just because we drive at this high level, we have to defend ourselves, I just don't understand it," said Vingegaards Belgian teammate, three-time stage winner and green jersey wearer Wout van Aert, when questioned about doping. Vingegaard himself, who was allowed to wear the dotted jersey of the best climber in Paris in addition to the yellow jersey, reacted much more calmly to the same question: "We are totally clean, every one of us. I can speak for the whole team: none of us takes something forbidden," he said, explaining: "We are so good because of our preparation."
One thing should be expressly emphasized at this point: There are no valid suspicions against drivers of the team. The presumption of innocence also applies to cycling, which was once chronically doping-infested and has made great progress in the fight against doping in recent years. "Cycling has changed," says van Aert: "We are checked at all times, not just on the tour - at home too."
There are also other explanations for the dominance than the use of illegal means to optimize performance: the Dutch have one of the highest budgets on the UCI World Tour. In addition, the team has been a leader in innovation and technology for years, and relies on the intake of ketones, among other things. This is a performance-enhancing dietary supplement, the consumption of which is medically questionable due to unexplored long-term effects, but is not prohibited.
With this innovative spirit, the only 25-year-old Vingegaard, the two-year-old super all-rounder van Aert and numerous other top drivers, Jumbo-Visma is well positioned to continue dominating the Tour in the coming years and superstar Pogacar as a team in check to keep. But the annoying questions will probably not go away even then.
