{"id":850304,"date":"2026-08-08T06:38:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-08T06:38:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/850304\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T06:38:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T06:38:11","slug":"i-produce-the-best-ive-ever-done-and-he-just-rides-away-from-me-jonas-vingegaard-asks-mattias-skjelmose-what-more-can-i-do-as-pogacar-gap-grows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/850304\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cI produce the best I\u2019ve ever done and he just rides away from me\u201d \u2013 Jonas Vingegaard asks Mattias Skjelmose \u2018what more can I do?\u2019 as Pogacar gap grows"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Skjelmose has now offered a glimpse of how Vingegaard discusses that situation away from the formalities of press conferences, having spoken regularly with the four-time Grand Tour winner during races.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat am I supposed to do?\u201d\u201cJonas is someone who has really developed as a person,\u201d Skjelmose said on Christian Fuhlendorff\u2019s Hva s\u00e5?! podcast<\/a>. \u201cI have been lucky enough to speak with him quite a lot when we are racing. We have some good conversations.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of those conversations centred directly on Pogacar. \u201cHe says: \u2018I produce the best I\u2019ve ever done. I can\u2019t do any more. What am I supposed to do? When I produce the best I\u2019ve ever done and he just rides away from me. I can\u2019t do any more.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Vingegaard\u2019s 2026 season offered little evidence of decline. He won Paris-Nice and the Volta a Catalunya before dominating the Giro d\u2019Italia on debut, taking five stages and completing his collection of victories in all three Grand Tours.<\/p>\n

Five weeks later, however, Pogacar again proved the stronger of the pair at the Tour. Vingegaard struggled particularly when the world champion accelerated on shorter and steeper efforts, a weakness he later suggested may have resulted from preparation geared too heavily towards the long climbs of the Giro.<\/p>\n

Michael Rasmussen rejected that explanation after the Tour.<\/a> The former Danish Tour contender called it a \u201cpoor excuse\u201d and argued that Visma had enough time to sharpen Vingegaard between the two Grand Tours. Rasmussen went considerably further with his assessment of the overall rivalry: \u201cVisma could have sent Jonas to the moon. The result would still have been the same: defeat to Tadej Pogacar.\u201d\"Jonas<\/p>\n

Vingegaard’s DNF meant the 2026 Tour was the first since 2020 not to have Pogacar & Vingegaard 1st and 2nd in some order<\/p>\n

Vingegaard still carries the expectation<\/p>\n

Pogacar\u2019s recent dominance has not produced another rider consistently closer to him in Grand Tours. Vingegaard remains the only man to have beaten the Slovenian twice at the Tour and finished either first or second in each of his first five appearances. His 2026 challenge ended through injury while he was again second overall.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think there is enormous pressure on him,\u201d Skjelmose said. \u201cBecause he is the only one who has been able to compete with him and he is the one who is closest to him. Everyone\u2019s expectations are on him, not just Denmark\u2019s. We are just lucky that he happens to be Danish.\u201d<\/p>\n

That expectation has followed Vingegaard even as Pogacar\u2019s advantage has expanded beyond the Tour. Since reclaiming yellow in 2024, the Slovenian has added further Grand Tour, Monument and World Championship success while remaining the benchmark Vingegaard is measured against each July.<\/p>\n

Vingegaard will turn 30 in December and remains contracted to Team Visma | Lease a Bike through 2028. His immediate concern is recovering from the fractured collarbone suffered on stage 15 of the Tour, with no date yet confirmed for a return to racing.<\/p>\n

Whenever their next Tour confrontation arrives, Vingegaard will do so having already beaten the performances that once made him a two-time champion. According to Skjelmose, that is precisely what has left him asking what more there is to find.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Skjelmose has now offered a glimpse of how Vingegaard discusses that situation away from the formalities of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":850305,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[49,48,635,5900,20987,82,1422,130976,636],"class_list":["post-850304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-jonas-vingegaard","tag-mattias-skjelmose","tag-sports","tag-tadej-pogacar","tag-team-visma-lease-a-bike","tag-tour-de-france"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=850304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850304\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/850305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=850304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=850304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=850304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}