Remco Evenepoel's coach on rocky preparation for World Championships: "He remains a human being, not a robot"

Remco Evenepoel has achieved his ultimate goals this summer, taking a brilliant podium and stage win at the Tour de France, followed by a win in both Olympic Games events. He will be a contender for both titles in the World Championships but his preparation included a few difficult phases, his coach Koen Pelgrim admits.

"Even without getting sick, the decompression would have had its effect. As an athlete, you are so focused, so motivated, exhausting your body. And you don't allow that accumulating fatigue and increasing stress. When all that suddenly falls away, you feel that all the harder," Pelgrim told Het Laatste Nieuws. "And you fall into a hole for a while. We drew up a training plan, but we had to adjust it in response to his feelings. Certain efforts were complicated, we noticed. Things that involved a little more intensity were challenging. Remco's body signaled that he had to be careful with that."

Effectively, Evenepoel was left with around one month to properly prepare for the World Championships, after taking time off the bike to celebrate and then travel after his Olympic success. Such was necessary after months of full-on hard work and focus on training and racing. Now he emerges in late September without an altitude training camp but also after a Tour of Britain where he was put under difficulties and couldn't achieve a good result in the overall classification.

However Pelgrim stresses that it was just a preparation race, and ultimately helped him towards his main goal. "Britain suited him. He worked hard. The relatively short but tough stages stimulated him. From his data output, we noticed that he recovered well daily and created a solid base to ramp up the training intensity again". The experienced coach now believes that Evenepoel is reaching a very good level once again but we will have to wait until this Sunday's race to better gauge how he stands against his rivals.

"I am confident he will reach a good level in Zurich. What exactly is that worth at the global level? We will get an indication of that in the time trial on Saturday. It's hard to estimate in advance because it also depends on the form of the day, and I don't know how strong guys like Ganna and Tarling will come out ahead," he argues. "Küng will be a tough contender. He remains a human being, not a robot that we can adjust meticulously anytime, anywhere."