Dan McLay has confirmed that he shall be leaving Visma-Lease a Bike on the finish of the yr, after a single season within the Dutch WorldTour squad.
With ten wins in his personal proper, the 33-year-old was signed to race primarily as a lead-out man for Olav Kooij in mid-October 2024, after the anticipated return of Mike Teunissen fell by way of when the Dutchman joined XDS-Astana.
Earlier than signing with Visma, McLay raced as a lead-out man with Arnaud Démare at Arkéa, the identical workforce the place he turned professional again in 2015 when the squad was sponsored by Bretagne-Seche Surroundings. In 2018 and 2019, he had a two-year spell at EF Training First after which returned to the French squad in 2020.
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At present racing on the Tour de Pologne to assist Kooij – a stage winner on Monday – McLay will subsequent head to the Renewi Tour with the Dutchman, previous to racing within the Tour of Britain. But when his short-term future is obvious, mid-to-long time period is at the moment a really completely different story.
“I am not signed up but, so if anybody needs me for the following yr or two, I am nonetheless going,” McLay, 33, informed Cyclingnews on a heat, dry Friday morning on the stage 5 begin of Pologne in Katowice.
“I believe Visma is off the playing cards, they need an enormous, pure bunch sprinter for subsequent yr, in order that guidelines that out.”
McLay stated his present situation is reasonable-to-good, with Pologne his first race for the reason that Copenhagen Dash in late June.
“I had a pleasant coaching camp in the summertime, so I am wanting ahead to getting again into it,” he stated.
“This time final yr, I used to be recovering from the Tour de France, so total my legs aren’t too unhealthy. And the solar’s shining too.”
Pologne itself has gone very nicely for the squad, with Kooij taking the opening mass dash on Monday, after which McLay’s fellow-Briton Matthew Brennan scoring a formidable victory on Friday’s very hilly leg to Zakopane from a a lot smaller entrance group of round 50 riders.
Thursday’s end in Karpacz was the one setback for Visma’s sprinters, however the severely technical collection of ultimate city laps made it very troublesome for nearly all of the groups, together with Visma, to work as cohesive items.
“We had been very proud of Monday, Thursday [stage 3] was a bit messy, it did not fairly go to plan, we form of all bought there at one level however by no means fairly collectively, so it was one to place behind us” McLay stated on Friday morning, earlier than Brennan later doubled workforce’s win tally in Poland. As for Thursday, Jesper Mørkov, Visma’s sports activities director at Pologne, merely dismissed the end in a workforce press launch as “very chaotic.”
Requested about how he has discovered Kooij to work with over the previous few months as a sprinter, McLay described the Dutch fastman as “Not needing an excessive amount of assist, so we all the time try to hold it free. I simply attempt to assist him when wanted, however we’re not too inflexible about it.”
The Briton’s time alongside the Dutch sprinter shouldn’t be but over, in any case, however McLay is understandably additionally involved about getting his personal future resolved for 2026, he says. Nevertheless, regardless of some low-level discussions, there may be nothing definitive for now.
“There’s been somewhat little bit of speaking, however not an excessive amount of greater than that,” he informed Cyclingnews. “So if anybody needs me, I am accessible.”
