Jumbo-Visma relies on Niermann
German ex-doper is the mastermind of the super team
07/19/2023, 07:30 am
Grischa Niermann spends his active career with Team Rabobank, where he also tries out doping. At the Rabobank successor Jumbo-Visma, the German is now the sports director of Tour de France title defender Jonas Vingegaard and driver of success.
As soon as Grischa Niermann speaks into his microphone, stars like Jonas Vingegaard and Wout van Aert listen attentively. “If I make an announcement in the race, then it will be done,” says the man, in whom quite a few see the mastermind of the super team Jumbo-Visma: “But before and afterward we discuss it together.”
Communication, openness and modesty are important to the German, who has been the sports director of the successful Dutch team since 2017. “We’ve gone through a very nice development here in recent years,” he says.
The former Rabobank team (1996 to 2012) has apparently put the dark times behind them, at the height of which at the Tour de France 2007 the doper Michael Rasmussen, who later confessed, was taken out of the race as the yellow jersey wearer. Numerous former Rabobank drivers have confessed to the use of doping substances. Thomas Dekker, for example, said in 2005 that doping was “part of the job”, and some even spoke of systematic doping in the Rabobank team. Niermann also said in 2013 that he had doped several times as a Rabobank driver.
At Jumbo-Visma they don’t feel like such discussions – unsurprisingly: “That’s such a shitty question – it comes up every year, just because we drive at this high level, we have to defend ourselves, I just don’t understand it”, said Vingegaard’s Belgian teammate Wout van Aert at last year’s Tour. Vingegaard himself explained: “We are so good because of our preparation.”
Niemann still likes to get on his bike
There are also other explanations for the dominance than the use of illegal means to optimize performance: the Dutch have one of the highest budgets on the UCI World Tour. In addition, the team has been at the forefront of innovation and technology for years.
Niermann played a large part in this development. He is responsible for preparation, race tactics, coaching and last but not least for the good atmosphere in the star ensemble. Thanks in part to a sophisticated team strategy, Captain Vingegaard was crowned winner of the Tour de France in 2022 – his chances of successfully defending his title this year are good.
“Of course you can’t plan for it to come to the point where we can win the tour with the team,” says Niermann about his personal career path. Today’s success is anything but a matter of course for the 47-year-old. Because: With the best will in the world, the professional cyclist Grischa Niermann was not a classic winner. From 1999 to 2012 he drove mostly as a helper for the Rabobank team, much more than winning the Lower Saxony Tour and 24th place in one of his nine tour participations did not jump out. Niermann still likes to sit in the saddle. “I always go cycling with the boys on the rest day or before the race,” says the Hanoverian. His “very friendly” management style seems to be a recipe for success.
There are no valid suspicions against drivers of the team. The presumption of innocence also applies to cycling, which was once chronically doping-infested and has made great progress in the fight against doping in recent years. “Cycling has changed,” said van Aert: “We are checked at all times, not just on the tour – at home too.”