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Between 2009 and 2019, New Zealand’s men’s rugby union team – the All Blacks – was ranked number one in the world. In 2013, that team won every match they played. Between 2015 and 2016, the All Blacks won 18 matches in a row, including the 2015 Rugby World Cup; and between 2009 and 2017, they won every match they played at home. Dominance does not come close to describing the grip they held over the sport.
The All Blacks are always mentioned whenever the conversation turns to the best sports teams of all time, just like FC Barcelona and the Chicago Bulls; outfits which didn’t just dominate their respective sports, but changed how the sport was played, and were era-defining. 15 years on from Barcelona’s epochal Champions League win in 2009, and the best football teams in the world are still playing in a way influenced by them. These are special teams, which will be remembered.
Last week, Visma-Lease a Bike became the first cycling team to win Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico in the same season, a fortnight after they had won both races of Opening Weekend for the second year in a row.
In 2023, the same squad, then known as Jumbo-Visma, became the first team to win all three Grand Tours in the same season. They might not have topped the UCI’s rankings last year – mystifyingly, that was UAE Team Emirates – but they are the dominant cycling team of now.
However, that is not enough for the Dutch team. They want to be thought of in the same breath as the giants of sport.
“We want to make sporting history,” the team’s CEO, Richard Plugge, said this week. “It would be wonderful to see Visma-Lease a Bike listed alongside legendary sports teams like FC Barcelona, the Chicago Bulls and The All Blacks. We want to move closer to historic status every year in our own unique way.
“Never before has the same team won Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico in the same year. I hope the winning doesn’t stop. We are very proud of Jonas [Vingegaard] and Matteo Jorgenson.”
The team can keep winning, across all types of races, in one-day races, week-long events, and Grand Tours, but can they be thought of like the All Blacks? That feels like a different issue.
There have been dominant cycling teams across the decades, from Molteni to Team Sky via La Vie Claire and Mapei, but few have cut through beyond the sport. Sky might have made it into the mainstream consciousness with the ‘marginal gains’ philosophy, but that has become more parody over the last few years, as the team has stopped winning everything.
Cycling is a niche sport, with the concept of making “sporting history” made harder as a result. Winning, being dominant in cycling, can also seem very boring, as more often than not, it is the same thing happening repeatedly. This could be levelled at the most successful Barcelona teams too, but football enlivens a larger audience. It is difficult to be legendary outside of cycling.
Visma-Lease a Bike can, and probably will, keep winning everything, but in order to be one of those squads which is referenced alongside the Chicago Bulls or the All Blacks, it feels like there needs to be more of a story, more of a cultural moment. The All Blacks have the Haka, and the fact that rugby is everything in New Zealand; the Chicago Bulls had Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, and the whole narrative around them, which has now become legendary.
Perhaps the squad needs more personality, more flair; this could be done through how they present themselves, how they use social media and produce content, and how they race. This is no slight against Jonas Vingegaard or Wout van Aert, or any of their other stars, who are supremely talented bike racers. In order to be the best at cycling you often have to live like a monk, but this makes it a tricky product to sell.
Visma-Lease a Bike are going to win a lot of bike races this year, as they did last year, and probably will for a lot of the 2020s, but in order to make “sporting history”, they need more of a story, to create more of a narrative, to become bigger than cycling. Whether they can do this is a harder question to answer than if they will win another Tour de France. They need to change the sport, and be known to people who don’t regularly watch Paris-Nice; a tough ask.
