{"id":981540,"date":"2026-05-24T08:36:23","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T08:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/981540\/"},"modified":"2026-05-24T08:36:23","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T08:36:23","slug":"i-have-nothing-but-respect-for-that-patrick-lefevere-defends-jonas-vingegaard-against-giro-charisma-critics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/981540\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;I have nothing but respect for that&#8221;: Patrick Lefevere defends Jonas Vingegaard against Giro charisma critics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>However, despite his flawless performance on the road, the two-time Tour de France winner frequently faces backlash for his conservative tactics (especially compared to <a href=\"https:\/\/cyclinguptodate.com\/tadej-pogacar\" title=\"Tadej Pogacar\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Tadej Pogacar<\/a>) and what some describe as a lack of flash or charisma. Critics also point to his predictable victory celebrations, which consistently involve blowing kisses to the crowd and kissing a photo of his family taped to his handlebars.Former Soudal Quick-Step CEO Patrick Lefevere, however, has no time for the negativity surrounding Vingegaard\u2019s low-key demeanor, as he recently <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wielerkrant.be\/nieuws\/2026-05-23\/alleen-maar-respect-voor-lefevere-gaat-tegen-de-stroom-in-over-wereldtopper-\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">made it clear<\/a> that all that criticism makes no sense to him.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t do it all myself, but if Jonas Vingegaard feels good about it, we shouldn&#8217;t judge,&#8221; Lefevere stated. &#8220;He just sings as he is built, and I find that a hundred times better than someone who pretends to be something they&#8217;re not.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>According to Lefevere, Vingegaard&#8217;s refusal to play into the modern trend of chasing popularity, building an artificial image, or hunting for internet likes is actually his greatest strength. &#8220;I have nothing but respect for that,&#8221; Lefevere concluded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"However, despite his flawless performance on the road, the two-time Tour de France winner frequently faces backlash for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":981541,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4104],"tags":[4230,31323,206179,79,16152,180916,16,15],"class_list":["post-981540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-jonas-vingegaard","tag-patrick-lefevere","tag-sports","tag-tadej-pogacar","tag-team-visma-lease-a-bike","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116628644661969651","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=981540"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981540\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/981541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=981540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=981540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=981540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}