He was only 25 years old and reached a milestone that any cyclist would be satisfied with: world champion and winner of the Vuelta de España at 22, double Olympic champion at 24, three Classics in San Sebastian and Liège. Remco Evenepoel says it and he is certainly proud of it, but he cannot avoid a touch of frustration. He, who for 18 years was considered the best junior in history, and won every career, at the most difficult World Cups, by knockout, when he turned professional at 19, he was shocked by the best rider in history, perhaps in absolute terms, Tadej Pogacar, and against the high mountain of the Tour de France, his maximum aspiration. Tired of being the spoiled child of Belgian cycling, and the most stuck, he decided last summer to breathe new life into his career. File for a German team that never fails to guarantee being a unique leader in big loop. “Thanks to Red Bull, in this team there is greater presumption, there are many more people and more average than in Soudal. Wind tunnel, experts everywhere…”, says the Belgian in his presentation, in a mass of Mallorca, with the Red Bull-Bora, neutral sweatshirt, without advertising brands. “I just have to focus on the bike, get out there and start racing.”
Question. Is facing Pogacar a joke of fate that we suspected was even bigger?
Answer. And on the field I met Pogacar… Mathieu, Vingegaard, Van Aert, Roglic… There haven’t been many generations in history where so many good cyclists have been brought together. Of course, there are always very special cyclists, like in the past, Peter Sagan, Philippe Gilbert, Valverde… They all had a very good level, but now we also have someone as special as Tadej… Each cyclist is special in himself, but it is clear that he has something more than everyone else…
P. Does it frustrate you to always be in your shadow?
A. Well, for me, you have more motivation to work to win, because, hypothetically, the team expects you to win careers and pays me to win careers… My work gets better every year and reaches its level to, at least, try to earn it. If it sells better, it’s better. If not, we must accept it and follow suit. But of course, it doesn’t demotivate me, it doesn’t sadden me, it doesn’t bore me…
P. It must be hard to go from being the best to finding someone who could be the best…
A. It’s difficult, of course, because you want to win and improve, but you also improve, and you improve… The level is very high, but I try not to stress too much about it and just do it, try to improve in everything. I just want to try to be the best again and, yes, I will work for him.
P. Topó with Pogacar, shocked by the Tour and, in addition, suffered a terrible fall during the Giro de Lombardía in August 2020 when the chain broke. Eddy Merckx suffered a similar fracture for 24 years and I always say it forever damaged his ability to climb the mountain, which he could only climb sitting on the hill. Have you felt anything similar?
A. Maybe yes, maybe not. When I was 20, I was very young then and I certainly lost several months of progress. Maybe it would be better now if you didn’t have this accident, but it’s the past and you can’t change it. But I also believe that even after the accident, I continued to have very good seasons.
P. It’s a long time for traffic while other cyclists progress and grow…
A. It took me a year to get back to a very good level, but I think it didn’t really change much because I continued to get a lot of good results, a lot of good victories. The sea could have been worse, and I’m sure of it, so I’m happy to continue cycling. It’s something closed and now I can only look further.
P. But I don’t think that without falling I would be a better climber on long climbs?
A. Yes, my overall fitness would probably be better because I lost eight months of not cycling. It’s huge. But I can’t think about it. I am in the present. I would probably be a slightly different cyclist and maybe have other accomplishments, but I won’t mourn the past.
P. Arriving at the WorldTour 18 years ago meant a revolution, the start of a trend that made all the guys want to go higher before reaching 20…
A. It’s hard to give an opinion because I don’t want to sound arrogant, but… When I was a junior, I won every career. I was Belgian champion, twice European champion, twice world champion… I was something, but now I see young people in the junior category who, when they win three careers, think they are ready to become professionals, and I believe that is not the case. At 17, I won more careers with five, six, 10 minutes of profit. Stay at a very high level. He was much better than all the other juniors. That said, I still had doubts about myself and should give up acting. Now, if a young person commits to just one career, we think they are ready.
P. Does this youthful madness make sense?
A. This scares me a little. My partner Lorenzo Finn, for example, is a good example of the opposite, a bright young man who chooses to spend a little more time in the under-23 category because he wants to progress. I believe that someone can have a more successful career than someone who has two or three careers and wants to move directly towards professionalism. It is dangerous that some become professionals too quickly… And I must not forget that during my first year when I won in San Sebastian, I was European time trial champion… Let’s win.
P. And in what way. I remember the 2019 San Sebastián Clásica. Escaping into solitude for several kilometers…
A. Yes, exactly, all the Movistar persecuted me and did not reach me, and I was 19 years old, so I believe that day demonstrated that I was ready to make the jump to the WorldTour, but some of the younger ones probably felt too ready because they were hopeful in training or in the test, but at the end of what a career story. You can be a world champion in a lab test, you can be as good as you want to be, but if you don’t have a career, that means you’re probably not ready to go professional, and that’s something that sometimes scares me and some young people, who want to go too fast.
P. But the teams also engage in fierce competition to register juveniles who consider themselves prodigious…
A. Exactly. So they have a lot of pressure very ready and, at some point, in their head, they are going to explode because they have to be at the top since they are very young, even if they are not prepared physically and mentally for that.
P. Was your retirement from the last Tour while climbing the Tourmalet the lowest moment of your career?
A. I was a big disappointment, but not so much, because I knew before the Tour that I was not as good as the year before, when I was third. In the background, it made sense. After breaking my shoulder in the winter, I returned to training with a fever. I got lost for several months, so it was normal for me to have high altitudes.
P. El Tourmalet is your damn mountain. He also suffered a serious fall during the Vuelta del 23…
A. And for me this year, it was easier to accept than in the Vuelta. But I believe that all these moments from the past make me stronger. When I give up on a career, I’m sad for a few days, then I look back and focus on the next one. And I hope that after the Tour I got a lot of good results (according to Pogacar) at the World Cup in Rwanda, in Europe and in Lombardy… I think that’s something he learned from the past: when something goes wrong, you have to forget about it and then concentrate on it.
P. When did I decide to grant paternal protection to Soudal and Patrick Lefévère?
A. Yes before the Tour, in June, after the Dauphiné. I spent wonderful years with Patrick. I am very grateful for everything I have done for myself. But there comes a time when you feel like you’re not improving and you need something new. And here I found a lot of people who want to improve themselves. I get input from everywhere, from communications equipment, to engineers, to trainers, to nutritionists, to chefs, everyone. You have helped me a lot to transform myself into a better version of myself.
P. Do you benefit from the same decision-making and election capacity?
A. Yes, we talk a lot about what we want and what we don’t want to do. We all decide what is best for the rider. It’s something that I really like and that I really need, that we all decide together what I need and what I’m going to do.
P. For a while it was rumored that in 2026 there would be the same program as Pogacar, the classics and the Tour. Finally, I decided to go solo to Liège and try it in stages when the fans were flying together, thinking of a face to face with the Slovenian in Flanders for example…
A. In exchange. If Tadej is there, he is not going to leave, because he too is just a runner. No, it doesn’t scare me that he’s there to compete with him. We calmly decide what is best for me, no more. So every time I find myself in a race, we’re going to compete and try to win. I believe it’s good summer several times during the season.
P. We are all waiting for him in Liège, the only race in which he beat him…
A. Always. It will be very nice to have a great battle, both in very good form in Liège… What a good duel like Bartoli and Vandenbroucke at La Redoute in 1999… And it will be Vandenbroucke, of course…
About The Author
