"Sport loses its essence" due to UCI points - Langeveld talks about EF Education-EasyPost's issues

Sebastian Langeveld has talked about the current situation of EF Education-EasyPost, and his opinion on the UCI points system that has been a great topic of discussion throughout the last few months.

“It is topical, but I find it an annoying and difficult subject... We will stick to our programs for now. At the moment - with all due respect - we don't suddenly add all kinds of small races just to score those points," Langeveld says of the American team's program. "That does not alter the fact that it can still come, but with the Tour de France the most important race of the year will follow," he told Wielerflits.

“Just look at the scoring, that is not good. We started 2022 as the twelfth. Looking at the last few years, we often score the most points from the Tour. Until now it has been very thin," he pointed out. However, Langeveld is positive that EF will be able to steer clear of the relegation zone at the Tour de France.

"Every team has its excuses. Our men who had to score either had corona, or were sick, or were out of shape in time or injured. In a selection that is not very broad because of the budget, you are in bad shape very quickly," he says. Such situation is the case with other teams, but EF have been having a particularly hard year and only Ruben Guerreiro and Esteban Chaves' results in the last few weeks has given some sort of security.

He continued: “I just hope that we don't come to the conclusion in August that we should have done extra races in May, June and July... We are going to try to go there with our best riders. We first wait for the period up to and including the Tour. If that doesn't go well, then we will – unfortunately – have to look at that relegation battle"

"I just find that very sad. In my opinion cycling is about winning races, not about getting as many points as possible. Then the sport loses its essence. That other teams suddenly start riding a lot of competitions, which doesn't have much to do with the training of young riders. That's just pure self-preservation, that's it," Langeveld shared. This season he hasn't been able to perform at the highest level, however he still plays an important role in the team, sharing his experience with it's younger riders in the cobbled classics specially.

Langeveld has revealed that retirement is in the cards for this winter. “At the end of the season I will discuss with the team whether I will hopefully ride another spring. And then we'll see what the future brings. Or is that the end of my career?"

However, he points out that he's still motivated to stay in the peloton: "I'm not over that yet. I want to enjoy cycling as long as possible, but with the emphasis on enjoyment. It shouldn't be a 'must'. I have the ambition to stay in the sport anyway. I am far from done with cycling, in any case," he concluded.