“I think our task is to be in the right position on the Taaienberg” – Wout van Aert identifies strategy for E3 Saxo Classic
Cycling
After a training block at altitude, Wout van Aert makes his long-awaited return to racing today at the E3 Saxo Classic. The Belgian star heads into one of his favourite cobbled events feeling refreshed and ready after some quality preparation in Tenerife.
“It was a very good training camp, very nice there too. I am happy with where I am,” van Aert told Wielerflits ahead of the race.
Van Aert knows better than most how demanding E3 can be. He won the race in both 2021 and 2022, but admits that this year, he’ll have to wait and see how his legs respond in competition.
“I can’t bring back the feeling from last year, so we’ll have to wait and see in the race anyway. This race is super tough. I think our task is to be in the right position on the Taaienberg, which will be crucial. I hope to be in the right position with several teammates after that.”
While the likes of Mathieu van der Poel dazzled at Milano-Sanremo last week in a historic battle on the Cipressa, van Aert was notably absent—a fact that didn’t sit easily with him.
“Really great. It hurt my cycling heart that I wasn’t there when the attack on the Cipressa,” he said, reflecting on the action from afar.
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- Nice though you have to ask why they call it a wildcard as it’s always pretty obvious who will receive them.Mistermaumau01-04-2025
- Absolutely, we are inundated by articles (not only in cycling or sport but everywhere from stocks to weather to elections) from self-called or popularly regarded experts making calls without reasoning. They basically know little more than any other informed or interested party and base everything on odds. The fact that they never have to justify their wrong calls post event but continue to get to make calls should get some attention. It would be cool if someone tallied up and recorded their predictions for future reference.Mistermaumau01-04-2025
- Yes, I agree but you’re taking risks writing such long posts here ;-) In that sense, the Tourless Primoz discussion is also pretty pointless as he virtually won a Tour (nobody would have counted on Tadej doing what he did at the last moment at that time and I guess it was bad karma for Primoz for so ofren cutting things so fine). I think you over interpreted my original thesis, it was not for trying to explain his current state, it was to suggest there was already mental material pre-crashes that has helped worsen his state, when it rains it pours. I really do remember having the feeling in that past he was more focused on not letting MVDP get better than him than doing his own thing. The seed of doubt was already planted and it doesn’t take much for doubt to grow in all sorts of directions.Mistermaumau01-04-2025
- i wouldn't count Pogi out. Low probability of a win, but not impossiblemobk01-04-2025
- Right now it doesn't seem that his legs are there or that his head is in the racevappaxbipmv01-04-2025
- would have been nice to hear exactly WHY he thinks pog has zero chance in some greater detail. i mean, tend to agree that his chances aren’t GREAT, but some explanation from the expert with an opinion would be nice. MINE is that, in spite of the recon he did where tadej concluded that the course “wasn’t that hard” i think that doing the full route at full gas is really going to beat up pogacar’s 145lb body, to a degree that he maybe isn’t expecting. but hey, we’ll see in a couple weeks. like everyone else, i do think it’s supercool that he’s going.OCexile01-04-2025
- Go back to that era and look at the lousy mechanicals he's had at Paris-Roubaix. Take those away, maybe he has another Monument, Van der Poel has one less, and suddenly all the rules change. Those mechanicals preceded his awful crashes - and you're right, that Tour was amazing. Ventoux, TT, and Champs-Elysees?! Something that Pogacar and Van der Poel can't do, just Wout. It still amazes me.RidesHills01-04-2025
- Oh, the impossibility of this kind of comparison. A pre-WW2 Binda had amazing statistics, and that was one era. During what I think of as the romantic era, Poulidor had an incredible run at the Tour without winning, and Bobet won some grand tours and some Monuments. In this modern era (for me: after Hinault), we've had multiple Monument winners win a grand tour (such as Valverde and Kelly, with Kelly the better rider in general), and then we've got someone like Roglic, the true GC rider. Sure there was a Monument that was kind of a fluke (both Pogacar and Hirschi might have won, and twitchy Alaphilippe deserved relegation), but what matters are the 5 grand tours and all these wins across the 1 week GC races except for the Tour de Suisse (you'd think he'd race it to get the set of them all). In this era, since 2000 or so, maybe he meets the description as best non-Tour winner. How many GC riders have these wins and not the Tour? To compare to other eras really is not possible. He's his own unique rider, and it's been amazing watching him for the past many years. That's about all we can say.RidesHills01-04-2025
- Ease up on a brother!bobo01-04-2025
- Primoz finds ways to win. Too bad he'll never take Tour de France.awp01-04-2025