PROFESSIONALS | 04/26/2024 | 4.33pm
by tuttobiciweb
The 23 year old Frank van den Broek is the new owner of the Presidential Cycling Tour of Türkiye, comes from the Netherlands and by winning the main stage of the race he took the lead in the general classification with just 4″ ahead of the Eritrean Merhawi Kudus and 9″ over the British Paul Double who finished behind him today. «I really didn’t expect to win the most important stage of this race, I’m only in my first year as a professional and I came to Türkiye to gain experience and discover my limits working for the team. I still don’t know what kind of runner I can become, until today I thought I was a complete cyclist, from today I could be considered a climber. Certainly not a sprinter,” van den Broek told the press.
Frank, who last year, when he was racing for Team Abloc, won the fourth stage of the Tour of Qinghai Lake ahead of Stefano Gandin after a long breakaway, knows that opportunities must be seized, and admits: «My task these days has been is to get the sprinters into a good position for the last 3 kilometers but my second goal honestly was to try my luck today, so I saved some energy which came in handy. It’s really fantastic to have won.”
The Dutch boy continues by analyzing today’s test in more detail: «There wasn’t one team that took control on the climb, several teams tried. The real selection began 4 kilometers from the finish line when the climb became steep. The gap in the general classification is small, I wasn’t able to break away from my rivals because I’m not a pure climber and so we played for the victory in a limited sprint” explained Franck who then continued by indicating his very short term objectives: «In the next few days I will be busy defending the turquoise jersey but in any case in addition to trying to win two more stages with the sprinters of our team.”
In the end a reference to nineties cyclist Frank Vandenbroucke: «We have the same name but the spelling is different and also our nationalities, I am from the Netherlands, he is Belgian. I watched some documentaries about him, I can’t be compared to him. What I can tell you is that when I was younger I also had platinum hair like him at some moments in his career.” In short, the young Dutch Frank has yet to discover what kind of rider he can be but in the meantime he showed up with a good victory.
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