Provisional #TDF2024 roster Visma- Lease a Bike: 🇩🇰 Jonas Vingegaard 🇺🇸 Sepp Kuss 🇧🇪 Tiesj Benoot 🇺🇸 Matteo Jorgenson 🇳🇱 Steven Kruiswijk 🇸🇮 Jan Tratnik 🇳🇱 Dylan van Baarle 🇫🇷 Christophe Laporte
"In Flanders they always criticize everything" - Christophe Laporte annoyed with criticism of Gent Wevelgem win alongside Wout van Aert
CyclingThursday, 28 December 2023 at 13:30
Gent Wevelgem this year was dominated by Team Visma | Lease a Bike. The Dutch team exploded the race and won with a one-two of Wout van Aert and Christophe Laporte. The Frenchman won, but was displeased by some criticism that emerged over van Aert not taking the victory.
"But the criticism afterwards was annoying. The media then talked more about Van Aert's gift than about the song that Wout and I performed together," Laporte says in words to Sporza. This wasn't the first time happening, but some argue this shouldn't have happened as the Belgian isn't bringing huge wins into his palmarès. "It was Wout's choice that I should be the first to cross the line in Wevelgem and I was very happy with that. But in Flanders they always criticize everything. When the two of us rode to the finish in E3 in 2022 and Wout won, there was no critical voice anywhere. But after Gent-Wevelgem there was a lot of criticism."
The Frenchman went on to become European Champion later in the year coincidentally ahead of van Aert, however directly beating him this time around. "I'm still one step below Wout and Mathieu. They have a great honors list and are the favorites in every race where they start. I am part of the group of riders among them. It is not always the strongest who wins the race, that is what makes cycling so beautiful," he argues.
Laporte has already achieved a lot since joining the Dutch team "I have already won a Tour stage and classics. The next step is a monument. That is the most difficult objective to achieve, but I am going for it," he admits. Such a versatile rider, he is capable of a lot and was also asked about possibly going for the points classification at the Tour de France. The priority in the team will likely remain the yellow jersey solely for this upcoming season however. "For me, the green jersey is not a goal to win, I would rather win a classic."
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- "The viewing and visitor figures are both better than when they were riding" - what a BS. Please compare (and only then) visitor figures during current season vs when WvA and MvdP are back in December (hopefully!) otherwise you are comparing oranges to apples.averagecyclist19-11-2024
- I counted 16 riders under 24 out of 43 that started. Once was only 16 ! Two of the top riders are Zoe and Schreiber and both under 23 yet that have done 50 min races in the past with the elites so I think it's just bad clock management. Let them race 50 freakin' minutes! One more lap could have made a big dffierence most times in the podium and winner.frieders319-11-2024
- He needs to finish out his contract and then go hit MTB and Cross/Gravel really hard, that's where his heart is.awp18-11-2024
- Pidcock is starting to sound like Froome now.Sweep18-11-2024
- I think this was because there were junior women in the race. If a race has junior women am pretty sure it has to be less than 45 minutes. I believe a rule is coming in for next season that will fine organisers that don't put on a junior women's race a fine equivalent to the prize money. So fingers crossed we should see more longer elite and junior women's races from next season.NorrisHippocampe18-11-2024
- Of course he CAN. Big salary in cycling is not when you win but when they talk about you (and your team / sponsors). For every news about Jonas, MVdP or Wout there are 10 times more(!) news about Pidcock (like everyday for last 2 months?). Since cycling is advertising sport not competitive sport (in terms of from money comes from) Pidcock is winner and GOAT - change my mind. ;-)averagecyclist18-11-2024
- Why do the women CXs keep getting short changed with the length of theor races? They could have easily done another lap to put them at 50 minutes which is their time limit. Yet another CX race where they fail to reach this when they had a chance to. Come on ... the math isn't that hard to figure out lap times and divide into 50 min!frieders318-11-2024
- All pro cyclists are massively underpaid! The amount of riding and physical exertion they put their bodies through is crazy compared to other sports. I can't think of any other sport where you are physically active at a very high level of power output for hours on end each day.Pogboom17-11-2024
- When I was working for Starkist/Heinz my manager quit. So the next week my group was put under another manager. During our first meeting he asked if there was anything we needed to tell him. I said that I would be out the following week on vacation. He said "I don't know if I can let you go on vacation". I replied, "You can't tell if I can go. You can only tell me if I can come back".Sweep17-11-2024
- :-)Sweep17-11-2024