Great ambitions for Remco Evenepoel at the start of the 2024 Tour de France. If on the one hand the Flemish talent tries to lower expectations for his first participation in the Grande Boucle, on the other hand it is clear that he cannot present himself at the start of Florence with the low profile. Aware of the great hopes placed in him, the captain of Soudal Quick-Step will therefore start with the bar very high, despite never wanting to set himself a real concrete objective in this, his first experience in transalpine GT, during which he repeats himself like a mantra that the primary objective is to learn and accumulate knowledge. Considerations that clearly do not prevent us from aiming to do and obtain the best possible, for ourselves and for the team.
On the other hand, his season so far is clearly heavily affected by the injury at the Tour of the Basque Country and his performance at the Tour of Dauphiné has clearly confirmed that there is still work to be done. If we add that he hasn’t been very well in recent days, thus also giving up the National Championships, some doubts remain about the actual conditions in which he presents himself at the start of this historic Italian Grand Départ.
“I wasn’t terribly ill, but I did have a slightly elevated heart rate,” he explained to Het Nieuwsblad, rejecting criticism from those who thought it was pre-tactics. “I was really ill, honestly I would have preferred to race the Belgian championship. […] Many runners left the Dauphiné with a cold. Some even with something worse. I was lucky because it remained latent until I trained for a few days in the bad weather after the Dauphiné and it hit me too.”
However, everything was over and in retreat at Isola 2000 he was able to train well in view of the most important match of his season. “It was fantastic – he underlines – We started and finished in bad weather, which obviously was less fun. But overall I managed to train well and take care of myself. I really did my best and got what I wanted (reaching my ideal weight, ed.). It was also necessary. With the weight of the Dauphiné I would never have been able to follow the best riders in the Tour. I had to work, but I did it. This is positive.”
A few days before the Grande Boucle, Evenepoel is therefore “hyper-motivated” for the upcoming three weeks, to which he presents himself with a team built around him, despite having had to make an important renunciation. “I think we start with the best possible team, given the resources we have – he explains – Unfortunately Mattia Cattaneo is ill and cannot come with us. It’s definitely a big loss, but Louis Vervaeke might be able to take his place. Our team is very balanced and experienced. There’s a bit of everything: Yves Lampaert, Gianni Moscon and Casper Pedersen as long distance runners and toilers. And with Mikel Landa, Jan Hirt and Ilan Van Wilder we have three pure climbers”
