Jumbo Visma has confirmed Tom Dumoulin will not return for the Tour de France and has re-allocated his place in its eight-man Tour roster to 24-year-old Jonas Vingegaard.
However, Dumoulin remains on list of Dutch athletes who
can be vaccinated against Covid-19 before the Olympics, meaning he has not
ruled himself out of the Games.
If he were to come back for the Olympics, and had
prepared properly for the TT in Tokyo, he would be one of the pre-race
favourites for a medal.
For now, however, Dumoulin remains on an indefinite break from cycling having decided to take a step back and consider his future in the sport. He left a pre-season training camp early just 24 hours after he had been named as co-leader with Primoz Roglic for the Tour de France.
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Vingegaard has been called up to the Tour team after a fantastic early season period during which the young Dane has won the summit finish stage 5 at UAE Tour, took two stages and the overall at Coppi e Bartali (2.1) and finished 2nd overall, and leading young rider, at Itzulia Basque Country (2.UWT).
Jumbo Visma sports director Grischa Niermann said he
believed Vingegaard was ready for the Tour, deserved his place and had already
ridden well at La Vuelta though he was still developing.
“We took Jonas into the team in 2019 because we saw that
he is really talented”, Niermann said. “He showed that straight away.
“In theory, Jonas can be a Grand Tour contender himself.
He also has a good time trial. But he needs time for his development. In that
regard nothing is better than riding a grand tour with Steven and with Primoz and
support them and also learn from them.”
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