{"id":74998,"date":"2026-08-24T10:49:07","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T10:49:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/74998\/"},"modified":"2026-08-24T10:49:07","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T10:49:07","slug":"brennan-wins-in-spain-but-visma-also-celebrate-elsewhere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/74998\/","title":{"rendered":"Brennan wins in Spain, but Visma also celebrate elsewhere"},"content":{"rendered":"

Matt Brennan stole the show on stage 2 of the Vuelta a Expa\u00f1a<\/a>. After a strong and surprising (for Tadej Poga\u010dar<\/a>) attack from Wout van Aert, Brennan finished off the move in emphatic style. But Visma | Lease a Bike<\/a> can also look back with satisfaction on a jam-packed week of racing in Germany, Belgium, and Great Britain. The Dutch team was active on three fronts and made its mark in three races. With one stage victory and numerous podium finishes, the final assessment for the yellow-and-black squad is overwhelmingly positive.Visma | Lease a Bike at the 2026 Tour of Britain WomenVisma | Lease a Bike didn\u2019t secure a victory in the Tour of Great Britain<\/a>, but that was to be expected given the dominance of Lorena Wiebes. She won four of the five stages, leaving just one for the rest of the field. That stage was claimed by Kim Le Court, who also sealed her overall victory with that uphill win.<\/p>\n

Visma had a key asset in Nienke Veenhoven for the sprint opportunities in England, but because the course was never truly flat, the 22-year-old sprint powerhouse was only able to really test herself twice. She finished fourth once and sixth once. The spotlight on the team fell on Femke de Vries, who still had strong legs after an excellent Tour de France.<\/p>\n

In fact, 32-year-old De Vries finished fifth in the overall standings, thanks largely to a fourth-place finish in the third stage, which was won by Le Court. \u201cI gave it my all,\u201d said a happy and surprised De Vries through the team\u2019s channels<\/a>. \u201cI didn\u2019t expect to finish fifth on this course, since I didn\u2019t think it would suit me.\u201d<\/p>\n

“It’s great to see that I can now compete on the short, explosive climbs. That gives me confidence for the upcoming races,” said the Dutch rider. Coach Jan Boven was also satisfied, even though a spot on the final podium had been the goal. \u201cFemke showed that she was on top of her game every day, and we didn\u2019t make any mistakes in that regard. Unfortunately, the podium wasn\u2019t within reach, but Femke has once again proven she can put in a strong overall performance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more below the photo<\/p>\n

Visma | Lease a Bike at the Renewi Tour 2026In the Belgian men\u2019s stage race last week, there was also a dominant force<\/a> named Jasper Philipsen. The Belgian rider from Alpecin-Premier Tech won three stages and the overall classification, and then there was Jonathan Milan, who also capitalized on a sprint opportunity. Visma | Lease a Bike didn\u2019t have a true sprinter on the team, but Filippo Fiorelli did make his presence felt.The 31-year-old Italian ultimately finished tenth in the overall standings. \u201cI think we can be very satisfied with the performances we achieved here,\u201d team manager Marc Reef said<\/a> in a positive assessment. Given that the team finished with only three riders due to crashes, two solid results were the best the team could have hoped for.<\/p>\n

Because in addition to Fiorelli, there was also the youth jersey for the talented Pietro Mattio. \u201cIt feels good to have won a youth classification in a WorldTour race for the first time,\u201d said the Italian. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t my goal at first, but when I found out on the third day that I was wearing the orange jersey, I decided to go for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reef concludes: \u201cWe had quite a few setbacks this week with riders who were forced to drop out due to crashes. Nevertheless, we kept our spirits up and held our own. With several top-ten finishes, a tenth-place finish in the overall standings, and the win in the youth classification, we can look back on a successful week.’<\/p>\n

Read more below the photo<\/p>\n

Visma | Lease a Bike at the 2026 Lidl Deutschland TourFinally, the Tour of Germany<\/a> \u2014and you guessed it: here, too, there was one rider who dominated the race. Isaac del Toro won a stage, lost one on Day 4, and secured the overall victory. Visma | Lease a Bike, however, was the main challenger to the Mexican rider from UAE Emirates-XRG, who on Day 2 had no answer to Louis Barr\u00e9<\/a>, who won a stage solo<\/a>.The Frenchman was unable to keep up with Del Toro on Day 4, but he did finish the Lidl Deutschland Tour<\/a> in second place overall. An excellent performance by the 26-year-old, who had also placed fourth in the Tour of Poland. \u201cI\u2019m incredibly happy with my second-place finish,\u201d Barr\u00e9 said on Sunday evening<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“At first, the course wasn’t exactly my cup of tea, because I prefer something a little tougher. But I felt good this past week, and it was great to race aggressively as a team every day. It\u2019s really wonderful that this has been rewarded with a stage win and a spot on the final podium.\u201d<\/p>\n

Team manager G\u00e4etan Pons had similar comments. He saw a strong team all week, and with one stage victory, the team also achieved its goal. \u201cThe fact that Louis finished second behind Del Toro, one of the best riders in the peloton, is an outstanding achievement. I look back on the race with a sense of satisfaction, and I\u2019m proud of what the team has shown over the past few days.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Matt Brennan stole the show on stage 2 of the Vuelta a Expa\u00f1a. After a strong and surprising…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74999,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[320,28700,28699,28703,28702,17,28701,9108],"class_list":["post-74998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-cycling","tag-deutschland-tour","tag-louis-barre","tag-matthew-brennan","tag-renewi-tour","tag-spain","tag-tour-of-britain","tag-visma-lease-a-bike"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}