{"id":819991,"date":"2026-07-24T03:06:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T03:06:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/819991\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T03:06:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T03:06:10","slug":"visma-boss-identifies-reasons-for-vingegaards-tour-de-france-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/819991\/","title":{"rendered":"Visma boss identifies reasons for Vingegaard’s Tour de France crash"},"content":{"rendered":"

For a long time, the 2026 Tour de France was relatively spared from serious crashes, but unfortunately, there were several incidents in the second half of the race. Richard Plugge<\/a>, riding for Visma | Lease a Bike<\/a>, saw his team leader Jonas Vingegaard fall behind<\/a>\u2014both literally and figuratively\u2014at a point where, in his opinion, it really shouldn\u2019t have happened.Ahead of Friday and Saturday\u2019s stages\u2014 both of which finish at Alpe d\u2019Huez<\/a> \u2014we spoke with Plugge. The team director of Visma | Lease a Bike, the largest cycling team in the Netherlands, has competed in the Alpe d\u2019Huez race himself on multiple occasions. He has also spoken out in the past about the impact of the large crowds, which are expected again this weekend.<\/p>\n

Plugge\u2014whose full article on the \u201cDutch mountain\u201d you can read on Friday morning\u2014cites the crowd as one of the two threats to the Tour de France. Another issue, which he says was proven once again for him and his team on Sunday, is the route that will be presented in France in 2026.<\/p>\n

Plugge: ‘The course is getting more and more dangerous’<\/p>\n

“It’s simply getting more and more dangerous,” he explains. “And that’s exactly why Jonas crashed on Sunday. It was a very dangerous spot that wasn’t properly marked. Life-threatening, in other words. As a result, we’ve now lost the number two rider in the Tour de France,” Plugge sighs.<\/p>\n

Vingegaard crashed at a roundabout during the stage to Plateau de Soilason. Victor Campenaerts\u2014at the front of the peloton\u2014cut the corner sharply behind the lead motorcycle, triggering a chain reaction. Vingegaard was riding fifth in line on the narrow roundabout when he hit the asphalt. The Dane suffered a broken collarbone as a result.<\/p>\n

At the roundabout, the central island was marked, but there were no other signs indicating just how dangerous it could be. According to Plugge, this is part of a larger problem that, in his view, isn\u2019t limited to the Tour de France. \u201cIt\u2019s just getting more and more complicated to make it safe, with all the speed bumps, roundabouts, and unmarked traffic islands.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another fall on Wednesday due to a poorly marked spotTwo days after Jonas Vingegaard<\/a>\u2019s crash, the Tour de France lost another general classification contender in Florian Lipowitz. On Wednesday, yellow jersey wearer Tadej Pogacar narrowly avoided a crash after several riders fell on an unmarked ledge. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For a long time, the 2026 Tour de France was relatively spared from serious crashes, but unfortunately, there…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":819992,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,6495,21528,85,346968,23372],"class_list":["post-819991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-jonas-vingegaard","tag-richard-plugge","tag-sports","tag-tour-de-france-2026","tag-visma-lease-a-bike"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/819991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=819991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/819991\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/819992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=819991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=819991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=819991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}