"Maybe he blew himself up" - Lotto-Intermarché provide update but do not worry about Arnaud de Lie

The Opening Weekend was the first opportunity for Arnaud de Lie to put in the specific work towards the cobbled classic monuments later this spring. The signs were mixed, as the Lotto-Intermarché rider struggled through them, but also showed improvement after the injury that hampered him this winter.

“Arnaud said: we are going to do it. He said he felt super. But maybe he blew himself up," team manager Visbeek said in an interview with De Standaard. “We saw a fighting Arnaud. He went deep in the Omloop, it is very possible he got a backlash from that now. Before that he rode the Tour of the Algarve, but that was a relatively easy stage-race, without really racing hard on two consecutive days. He does not have that hardness yet.”

De Lie was in the mix at Omloop het Nieuwsblad but ultimately, like many others, ended up crashing. He was involved in a fall right before the Muur de Geraarsdsbergen together with Matthew Brennan in the reduced peloton, and rolled in 62nd place at the finish line. At Kuurne - Bruxelles - Kuurne he struggled in the difficult section of the race and didn't have the legs to follow.

However it must be taken into consideration that this is not De Lie at his regular level, as the Belgian rider had an ankle injury in the opening weeks of the year. His schedule started out initially at the Spanish one-day race openers in late January however he only got going on the 15th of February at the Clasica de Almeria. There and at the Volta ao Algarve he put in two solid sprint stage results, but is still in need of rhythm for the more difficult races where he usually thrives in.

“If you take that into account, Arnaud is further now than we dared to hope five weeks ago. If you had told us then that Arnaud would ride an Omloop like that, we would have considered it very optimistic," the manager of Lotto-Intermarché added.

With Tirreno-Adriatico now to be raced next week, the Belgian faces a difficult week in which he will hope to be improving on his form before the main goals of the spring come around. “I am certain he will make progress stage by stage. I have no doubt about that. A stage race like that works for Arnaud. We have seen it before, for example at the Tour de Suisse on the way to the Tour.”