Vingegaard loses key support rider Kuss days before tour start

Dane Jonas Vingegaard suffered a blow to his hopes of a third straight Tour de France title after US rider Sep Kuss was ruled out of the race due to Covid-19, their Visma-Lease a Bike team announced on Tuesday.

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Climber Kuss, 29, won last year's Vuelta a Espana and has been replaced in the outfit by Dutch rider Bart Lemmen.

"This is of course very hard for Sepp in the first place," Visma's sporting director Merijn Zeeman said in a team statement.

"His contribution is always very important in the team, but then of course he has to be completely fit.

"Unfortunately, we had to conclude together today that this is insufficiently the case, after Covid. He now needs to recover properly and will therefore not start.

"Fortunately, we have a good replacement ready with Bart Lemmen," he added.

Vingegaard is likely to battle with fellow two-time winner in Slovenian Tadej Pogocar for the overall title.

The Tour begins in Florence, Italy on Saturday before ending in Nice on July 21.