Interview | Jumbo-Visma team managers Reef and Engels quickly left cloud nine: "Started again right after Giro"

Barely two weeks after Primoz Roglic raised the Trofeo Senza Fine in Rome, part of the Jumbo-Visma Giro team is already back to racing and coaching in Switzerland. Koen Bouwman, Rohan Dennis and Sam Oomen are present there as riders, but team directors Marc Reef and Addy Engels are also getting back to business as usual.

After the opening time trial won by Stefan Küng, IDLProCycling.com approached Reef with the big question: how do you switch gears so quickly after a grand tour? "I don't know if it's different for the riders, but Addy and I started preparing for this race right after the Giro. We enjoyed it for a day or two, but then we quickly went back to business as usual," Reef explains.

So, what exactly was/is business as usual? "That meant preparing for this race," says Reef, who is in Switzerland with team leaders Wout van Aert and Wilco Kelderman. "Before the Giro, not much was known about it. During the Giro, you are focused on that race, so there isn't much time. It's not like you can prepare for all this in just one day - it takes time."

Therefore, Reef and Engels couldn't stay on cloud nine for too long, both literally and figuratively. "It was a bit of a quick switch, but you get back into it in the following days. However, we really do want to keep up that winning mentality," he refers to the successes in both the Giro and Dauphiné. "We want to achieve that in the coming days as well."

Reef on Van Aert: "Wout always wants to win"

In stage two of the Tour de Suisse, there is already a good opportunity for Van Aert. "Monday is for Wout, one hundred percent. We will do everything for him. We expect a sprint with riders such as Tim Merlier, with everyone there. Unless a team really wants to make things difficult for us, but then it's still a pretty wide road towards the finish. This stage offers the best chance for the whole peloton, which is different for stages six and seven. But well, Wout always wants to win."

The Belgian also wanted to win on day one, but a third place turned out to be the highest achievable. "I think we had a very good time trial with Wout. The beginning, in particular, was very strong, but the conditions had changed. The wind had shifted during the time trial. We tried to save some energy for the end, but he didn't quite have enough left to really make that difference in the final part."

Tom van der Salm (Twitter: @TomvanderSalm)