"We deliberately kept it secret."
Good morning,
These are today's quotes and interviews worth your time.
Stood out to me today: "Arnaud is a man of extremes. If he's in good form, everything is fine. If you do a bad lead-out and he still wins, he'll find something positive to say, even if he has to get creative."
¡Vamos!
🎤 INTERESTING INTERVIEWS
"We deliberately kept it secret to create a special moment for the fans."
Ralph Denk on the Evenepoel Ronde van Vlaanderen reveal
The story had been building for months. When Remco Evenepoel published his race program in December, he ruled out the Ronde van Vlaanderen with unusual certainty: "How sure am I that I won't start? Very sure. 100 percent sure? 100 percent sure. No small chance either? No, unfortunately not." Ralph Denk, General Manager at Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe, backed that line up at the time, saying a steady buildup toward the Tour de France was the priority after a difficult 2025.
Then on April 1st, Evenepoel posted on Instagram: "Flanders, are you ready? See you Sunday." Denk revealed the full story to Sporza: "The bond between Remco and the Ronde van Vlaanderen is deep and emotional. A plan like this doesn't come together overnight. We deliberately kept it secret to create a special moment for the fans — and to reveal it as a surprise on April 1st."
Denk added that the fact it stayed under wraps for over 100 days spoke to the team's cohesion. Evenepoel's teammate Gianni Vermeersch, who had trained with him on the Flemish Ardennes climbs back in December and then publicly deflected all speculation, had offered this line at the time: "If I'm wrong and Remco rides the Ronde after all, come back to me. I'll be the scapegoat." Vermeersch, it seems, has some explaining to do.
"Sometimes I'm more of a tightrope walker than a teammate."
Cédric Beullens on life alongside Arnaud De Lie
The HLN series "The Domestique" featured Cédric Beullens this week, the 29-year-old who has served as the closest racing confidant of Arnaud De Lie at Lotto - Intermarché. The portrait that emerges is of a rider who has mapped every contour of an unusually demanding personality.
On how De Lie operates: "Arnaud is a man of extremes. If he's in good form, everything is fine. If you do a bad lead-out and he still wins, he'll find something positive to say, even if he has to get creative: 'Good job, mate. You weren't there, but that made space for me.' But when he's off form and doesn't win, he'll always find something to improve, even if you did the perfect lead-out."
The emotional cycles run deep. "If something's weighing on him, never message Arnaud right after a race. Wait a few days. He needs to be alone first." After a botched sprint at the Volta ao Algarve, De Lie left the finish area without a word. Then at dinner: "Hey mate, well done today! I was angry at myself and needed to cool down. It wasn't you." Then he started telling jokes all evening.
The power dynamic is something Beullens has studied and quietly mastered. "Arnaud doesn't like being told what to do, but he doesn't like it when you say nothing either. The art is telling him what to do without him realizing that's what you're doing. It's a delicate balance and it's purely about emotional intelligence — but I've found it. Sometimes I'm more of a tightrope walker than a teammate."
On his own position: "When he's not in good form, he trusts very few people. Maybe nobody." Beullens also notes a significant shift this spring: "I see that he's very relaxed right now. With Arnaud you know he's in good form when he's on the bus giggling at videos on Instagram or TikTok. The more you hear him on the bus, the better he's feeling."
"Right now I would discourage my young child from entering the sport."
Dan Bigham and Adam Blythe on cycling's safety problem
Rouleur brought together two voices prepared to say what many in cycling won't: former Hour Record holder Dan Bigham, now head of engineering at Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe, and former pro and current Eurosport commentator Adam Blythe. The subject was safety, and neither pulled their punches.
Bigham on why he became vocal: "As an engineer you think more about safety than anyone else in the sport. I've become a willing spokesperson because so many people shy away from this topic, as it's seen as a negative. But right now I would discourage my young child from entering the sport as it's scary and dangerous."
On what needs to happen: "It took an hour for someone to attend to Muriel Furrer at the World Championships in 2024. That's shit. Not good enough." His diagnosis of the core problem focuses on infrastructure, not speed: "The data supports the fact that the main cause of crashes is road infrastructure and things you're hitting, so make that safer and we're in a much better place."
He is equally blunt about the UCI's safety database: "I want to give our team's GPS data to explain what happened in the lead-up to a crash, but they don't want it. Why, if I am trying to get involved in helping, do I get stonewalled every single step of the way?"
Blythe brought the rider perspective. On why big names don't speak up: "When Tadej Pogačar is winning everything, he doesn't want to be the person to say 'let's change this' on safety, because then everyone is looking at him. If it's too cold, wet or windy, you can have 70 percent of the peloton stand up and say they're not racing, but if Tadej says he wants to race then the race is on, no questions about it. That's why getting riders to speak up collectively on safety is so difficult."
On the decline of bike handling skills in the peloton: "I grew up playing out on my bike, learning my bike craft from five to 16, going over jumps and bumps in the woods. Kids don't do that anymore. It's really difficult to teach someone after the age of 19 how to handle a bike properly."
"We do 101 repetitions of it — with nausea and a lot of lactic acid as a result."
Wesley Van Dyck on the Kings of the Flemish Mountains
A Strava side story with genuine charm. Sporza profiled Wesley Van Dyck and his group of 13 fellow amateur riders who call themselves the "Kings of the Flemish Mountains" — their mission: hold the Strava KOM on every one of the 57 climbs ever ridden in the Ronde van Vlaanderen. They currently hold 36 of them.
"Some pro riders think what we do is really impressive. Others feel a bit stung," Van Dyck says. Anyone studying the top times on Strava for the Ronde climbs will often find an unknown rider at the very top — chances are it's one of the Kings.
"We had the Strava KOM on 41 climbs a while back. But Victor Campenaerts and his friends worked really hard last year to take 8 KOMs from us," laughs Van Dyck, who spent one year as a pro rider himself.
The tactics are more elaborate than you'd expect. "There's a real strategy behind it," Van Dyck says, grinning. "Sometimes we go out with 6 or 7 guys." They have two riders who are almost two meters tall, acting as windbreaks and riding alongside the finisher for the first 30 seconds. Even the relay points are strategic. "We ride from mailbox to mailbox, where a change happens each time. But that plan often goes wrong because we lose each other or someone rides into a pothole."
"Training involves something Van Dyck calls "the Pogačar drill": "Pogačar squeezes everyone dead on his wheel climbing, then stands on his pedals for half a minute before returning to the pace before his attack. We imitate that approach in training. We do 101 repetitions of it — with nausea and a lot of lactic acid as a result."
Beyond the absurd training sessions, the KOM hunters are maniacal about their equipment. "For our attempt on the Koppenberg and Berg ten Houte, we imported specially made tires from Australia," Van Dyck says. "We also always account for wind direction and heat in our climb attempts. So there's a lot of preparation involved."
Campenaerts has taken notice — and taken action. After the Kings recently snatched the top time from Florian Vermeersch on the Volkegemberg, Campenaerts responded on Instagram: "Florian, we need to win that KOM back." "It creates a fun challenge between the pros and us," Van Dyck says.
🏆 THE SERGE BAGUET AWARD
Not awarded today
Wonder what The Serge Baguet Award is all about? Check it out here.
💬 QUICK QUOTES
"After the first hill, I broke my front wheel and had to change my bike for the first time. And then I broke my handlebars. After the second bike change, I thought the race was done for me. But I never gave up." — Filippo Ganna after winning Dwars door Vlaanderen, Cycling Pro Net
"I thought third time is a charm for quite a while, but apparently not. Good thing is I didn't finish in the hospital this time, so I always look to the positive side." — Wout van Aert in a post-race interview after Dwars door Vlaanderen, Cycling Pro Net
"It's cursed here." — Wout van Aert's immediate reaction after crossing the finish line at Dwars door Vlaanderen, on X
"Fuck. Yeah. Well, I don't know if you can say that, but yeah, it was really a great race. It's incredible. Just to be able to sit in his wheel and ride the final with a guy like him." — Niklas Larsen, the last rider able to follow Wout van Aert at Dwars door Vlaanderen, speaking to Cycling Pro Net
"I have so much respect for you, you're unbelievable, good job!" — Mads Pedersen to Wout van Aert after Dwars door Vlaanderen, on X
"I think he needs to call my girlfriend, because she's preparing a fantastic dinner for Easter. I've got dinner, and my TV is like 65 inches, so I can sit on the sofa and see the race really well." — Filippo Ganna on his DS's suggestion that his plans for the Ronde van Vlaanderen might change, to CyclingNews.
"Not everyone will have expected him to be at the start of races like this, but these are races he loves, where he can make history. That really excites Remco. And he can make it a reality." — Sven Vanthourenhout, sports director at Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe, on Remco Evenepoel's ambition for the Ronde van Vlaanderen, on Remco Evenepoel's YouTube channel.
"I'd heard that news back in February. There was speculation, yes. Some people didn't believe it, but I did. I would have loved to see him ride it when he was still on our team." — Yves Lampaert, former teammate of Remco Evenepoel, on Evenepoel's decision to ride the Ronde van Vlaanderen for the first time, speaking to Sporza.
"I told him for years that he should ride the Ronde, but he didn't want to back then. Now maybe he has people around him with more influence over him. It looks like he's changed his mind, and someone convinced him." — Patrick Lefevere on Remco Evenepoel's participation in the Ronde van Vlaanderen, to HLN.
"It's easily ten times more. Every now and then that feels strange, but then it's always important to go back to the moment you were grateful just to sign for that money." — Former pro Bert De Backer, who rode as a domestique for the likes of Marcel Kittel and John Degenkolb, on the salary gap between leaders and domestiques, speaking on Money Time.
"Evenepoel has undergone a very positive character development. In similar race situations before, he sometimes lost motivation and abandoned spectacularly. He even worked for Lipowitz on the last day. That was teamwork at the highest level. Remco took the role of super domestique to a whole new level." — Jens Voigt on a changed Remco Evenepoel at the Volta Ciclista a Catalunya, to Eurosport.
"I'm not super impressed with myself. I thought I was at a different level than I actually was. I just hoped for more." — Mattias Skjelmose after finishing 7th at the Volta Ciclista a Catalunya, to TV2.
"When I saw Lieke coming, I thought: what the fuck? I heard on the radio: 'Visma is coming really fast', but the radio was behind. I could already see her going." — Marlen Reusser on the moment Lieke Nooijen came past her and Demi Vollering in the final kilometer of Dwars door Vlaanderen, to Het Nieuwsblad.
"Lieke came from behind with a lot of speed, and I tried to push Reusser to the front. She told me she was going for the podium with Cat Ferguson. I kept gambling after that until I thought: if I don't respond now, Nooijen wins. So that's when I went." — Demi Vollering on the final sprint at Dwars door Vlaanderen, to WielerFlits.
"It was fully booked. But that might be karma, because the weather in Andorra was fantastic and on the Teide they were a bit fucked. Sometimes it goes that way." — Marlen Reusser on why she chose Andorra over Tenerife for altitude training, to In De Leiderstrui.
"The odds are more likely yes than no." — Wout van Aert when asked whether he will be a retired cyclist in five years, in the Wielerclub Wattage podcast.
That's it for today. See you tomorrow 👋
Jay