"I just had nothing left in the sprint. Remco Evenepoel really broke me" - Wout van Aert makes no excuse as Brabantse Pijl close call ensure wait for win goes on
Cycling
Wout van Aert's wait for a win in 2025 goes on. The Belgian came up just short at Brabantse Pijl 2025, losing out to compatriot Remco Evenepoel on the his return to racing in a thrilling two-up sprint for the line on Friday afternoon.
Although the disappointment was obvious after yet another close call, Van Aert was not looking to make excuses afterwards, instead opting to praise his fellow Belgian, who was making his first appearance in the peloton of the season. “Of course, I would’ve preferred to win - especially in this situation,” Van Aert said honestly in his post-race interview after crossing the line. “But I just had nothing left in the sprint. Remco really broke me in that final hour; even just staying on his wheel was a struggle. He deserved the win. That’s why I’m not too disappointed - he was simply the stronger rider today.”
Is there a real cause for concern when it comes to Van Aert's sprint though? This is far from the first time this season that the Team Visma | Lease a Bike star, who don't forget has won numerous Grand Tour sprints, has been beaten by riders you'd always expect him to finish faster than. “I wish I had an answer to why my sprint hasn’t been coming together in races," admits Van Aert in conclusion. "The only explanation I have for today is that I suffered a lot and was already over my limit before the sprint even started.”
The positive for Van Aert and Visma however, is that surely, if he keeps knocking on the door of a win in this manner, it can't be to long before he finally gets it right in the finale and with the Amstel Gold Race and the Giro d'Italia coming up for the 30-year-old, there is still hope of big wins this year.
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Remco Evenepoel qui tape Wout Van Aert dans un sprint à 2 non c'est fort de la part de Remco mais Wout ça m'attriste #DBP25 pic.twitter.com/Ysw1qTFRK8
— Cycling Legend (@CyclingLegend_) April 18, 2025
Kieran WoodDeputy Editor-in-Chief
Kieran Wood is a sports journalist based in Wales and has been active in journalism since 2022. He regularly contributes to DartsNews.com and CyclingUpToDate.com, where he covers professional cycling and darts. In cycling, his work includes liveblogs from major races, including the Tour de France, the Giro d’Italia, and La Vuelta a España, alongside race reports and analysis. He has also conducted interviews with professional riders.
His reporting spans the full racing calendar, from one-day classics to stage races, with a focus on accurate, real-time coverage and clear contextual analysis. For statistics, results, and historical context, he regularly uses resources such as ProCyclingStats. To support reporting on rider activity and training context where relevant, he also references Strava.
In his work, Kieran places strong emphasis on careful sourcing, editorial accuracy, and updating articles as new, verified information becomes available.
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- Just looked again at the photo. Yeah I stand by that. If MS had fallen over in Brands direction I don’t even think she would have hit her. You must be a UCI race commissioner. I’ll be sure to check my sock height should I ever see you on a ride. Looks like everyone else on here sees what I see.mij08-11-2026
- I said looking at the photo it doesn’t appear she deviated. Chill out, not stating my word is the final judgement. Just commenting that based on the photo I don’t see it. And BTW the Dutch coach even said she didn’t impede her.mij08-11-2026
- Blah Blah Blah !frieders308-11-2026
- MS said she was changing gears so that caused her slight deviation. Nothing was intentional.frieders308-11-2026
- How can you use a photo post incident to judge the incident itself (which is not hard to find if you’re prepared to invest the same amount of time in searching as writing that comment? It’s harsh but technically right even though this or worse is not always sanctioned in every race. The two things that went against MS (who unfortunately for her would still have won without making her mistake) are that it was not a bunch sprint where there could have been an overlooked incident or mitigating circumstances explaining a deviation. Everything was focused on just those 2, Schreiber was riding beautifully balanced which made her sudden deviation look unnatural stroke as if it could have been in some part intentional whilst she was slowly drifting ever closer towards the barrier to a point that would have reached obstruction level. In her defence, it might have been the realisation she was heading towards that that made her react suddenly and caused the deviation involuntarily. In any case, congratulations to her for the ride of her life, in people’s minds she will be credited for it.Jumpyjohn07-11-2026
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- I think that they're not really used to dealing with this type of incident in a cyclocross race, and the situation has been magnified because it was a race for a championship title. It's very unfortunate that the race had to be decided in this way.
santiagobenites07-11-2026 - Seriously why do they keep doing stupid things like this. Its one thing to relegate when the placings are minor, when the action is blatant. But when it is ambiguous, why dont they at least take advice from some higher up to avoid embarrassing themselves. This is similar to the Halland goal when his teammate was clearly offside and interfered in play and VAR gave them the goal. if you dont have evidence you cannot convict. Even for doping they have these rulesabstractengineer07-11-2026
- So all those who went to watch, including all from abroad, waled there, spent nothing? Most places hosting events of the sort manage to make it worthwhile. If it was so obviously fruitless, don’t you think by now they’d have run out of hosting candidates? Why do you think the Tour can command such high prices for departure and arrival locations? If it didn’t bring anything locally they’d have to pay to get authorisation to use cities.Jumpyjohn07-11-2026
- What a travesty ! That little deviation did nothing to impede Brand !frieders307-11-2026
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