After seven years loyal service at Soudal - Quick-Step, Kasper Asgreen begins a new era of his career in 2025 at EF Education-EasyPost. A former Monument winner and Tour de France stage winner, can the change of scenery fire the Dane back to his best after a quiet 2024?
Sadly, given all his success whilst at Quick-Step, Asgreen found himself unable to leave on a high last year, with a 16th placed finish at Milano-Sanremo, a 6th placed finish in Zurich at the World Time Trial Championships and runner-up placings on the road and against the clock at the Danish National Championships being the only notable results. "It wasn't what I had hoped for," Asgreen admits honestly in conversation with Feltet.dk. "There were some okay moments, but I like winning the most, and I didn't really do anything about it. And it annoys me. It really annoys me."
As mentioned though, with a change of teams bringing Asgreen a fresh start, the 29-year-old Dane is keen to get back to winning ways. “That, along with changing teams, has given me a lot of motivation going into the winter,” he explains, revealing a new approach to the off-season preparation.
“I started training earlier than I ever have before,” Asgreen reveals. “This year, only two weeks went by, and then I thought, ‘I’m going to go out and ride a bike – I’m going to get started.’ So it was great to feel that despite a tough autumn – with both the Vuelta and the World Championships – my head was up and ready to give it a go towards 2025.”
And in that training, Asgreen is attempting to re-find his mojo. "I've kind of pulled the plug on some of the more experimental things," he concludes. "I've probably gone back to focusing on the basics to make sure the basics are in order before you start playing with all sorts of fancy extra loads on the body that might - might not - help. So I focus on what I know has worked for many years - not just for me, but for many other riders."