11/10/2023

Remco Evenepoel recollects Vuelta a Espana crack: "That day it all became too much for my body"

Remco Evenepoel did not strike luck at the Grand Tours this year. Although he won stages at both Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a Espana, his goals of fighting - and winning - overall classifications failed, for different reasons. He recalls some of the most marking moments of the season.

He was not unhappy with his season but there was something missing. "It could have been even more impressive, without the Covid infection in the Giro or with slightly better preparation for the Vuelta. In that sense, I consider this season as 'not completely successful',” Evenepoel told Het Laatste Nieuws. “I lack a podium place in a Grand Tour. Which means I don't give my season a 10 out of 10, but rather an 8.5 to 9."

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He won Liége-Bastogne-Liège for a second time in April in the build-up to the Giro d'Italia. There, he won both time-trials in the opening week and was leading the race when he tested positive for Covid-19. Asked if he could've won it he replies: “We'll never know, but… I think so. I wrote down values that I never achieved before and during my successful 2022 Vuelta a Espana.”

And the Vuelta was a different story. Evenepoel admits he made mistakes in the preparation, having put too much emphasis in the Clásica San Sebastián and the World Championships - where he was successful however. "While my competitors' base strengthened, mine fell away for a while. Then I would quickly try to make up for what I had lost there during my training camp in Andorra. With sessions of seven or eight hours a day, something you do a month before a Grand Tour. Not in the last ten days," he says.

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Whilst he looked good in the first week of the race, and virtually all days, on stage 13 he was a shadow of himself. “I thought I recognized the same symptoms as in the Giro. 'Crap', I thought. 'I've had it again'. Not so. We have studied everything carefully. And so we came out effectively with that difficult preparation. That day it all became too much for my body." Evenepoel lost full possibility of fighting for the overall classification, losing contact with the GC group in the first climb of the day.

"'Stop' it said. 'Done with it, it's been good, solve it yourself'. My head still wanted to, but my legs no longer followed suit. I solved. Physically, but also mentally. And took a day off, which upon reflection worked wonders. Because the next day I was back to my old self. Very weird." Evenepoel bounced back to win two stages and the KOM classification, however it was a secondary prize to that he initially pursued.