There’s logically been a lot of discussion in these past two weeks about Visma-Lease a Bike and the Giro d’Italia, given Jonas Vingegaard’s recent announcement that he’ll be taking part next May. But while Vingegaard wearing pink would become one of the standout images of the 2026 season, it shouldn’t be forgotten that over the winter one of Visma’s three former Giro d’Italia leaders – Wilco Kelderman and Steven Kruijswijk being the other two – quietly left the ranks of Vingegaard’s squad for a fresh start.
Even if there wasn’t much of a hubbub when the third of this trio, Attila Valter, ended his three-year stint at Visma-Lease a Bike, in some ways, it wasn’t surprising.
After a very promising 2023, where Valter had helped the team leaders take all three top spots in the Vuelta a España overall, and then a third straight Hungarian National Championships road race victory and fourth place in the Olympic road-race in 2024, Valter suddenly lost traction in 2025. Not only were there no significant results in his own right, for the first time since being a Continental pro, the 2021 Giro d’Italia pink jersey-wearer and established GT team worker found himself not doing any Grand Tours at all.
The writing wasn’t necessarily on the wall in terms of his time at Visma-Lease a Bike and the 27-year-old believes he likely could have continued there as a team worker – although the team, subsequently, told Cyclingnews they’d already said to his manager as far back as January 2025 that Valter could look for another squad for 2026.
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