Tour of Poland announces after Vingegaard also Kooij as participant for Visma | Lease a Bike

In a few weeks, the final part of the cycling season will start, which will change somewhat in terms of schedule due to the inclusion of the Olympics. Many riders are currently working toward that part of the season, which includes the Tour of Poland and Vuelta a Espana.

The Polish WorldTour race kicks off on August 12 in Wroclaw and after the Tour de France was already able to announce the participation of Jonas Vingegaard on behalf of Visma | Lease a Bike. The Dane announced at the time that he will resume competition in Clasica San Sebastian and will thus be seen afterwards in Poland, where he already recorded a stage win in 2019.

Olav Kooij, who won a stage in the recent Giro d'Italia, will also appear at the start on behalf of the Dutch formation. That announced the organization. The Dutchman is announced in the line of sprinters for the Tour of Poland, which - to date - also consists of Tim Merlier and Alberto Dainese. Kooij already achieved stage success at the Tour of Poland twice in recent years and will thus be looking for a three-year series. 

Other riders the organization announced are defending champion Matej Mohoric and Bahrain Victorious' Pello Bilbao, who dropped out of the Tour, local hero Rafal Majka (UAE-Team Emirates) and French climbers Romain Bardet (dsm-firmenich PostNL) and Valentin Paret-Peintre of Decathlon AG2R. Thibau Nys (Lidl-Trek) himself already announced that he will compete in the Polish stage race.

Because the Tour of Poland overlaps with the Vuelta a Espana, it is likely that all of these riders will not appear at the start of the last grand tour of the year. That will start on Aug. 17 in the Portuguese capital of Lisbon with a short individual time trial.