"Starting there and knowing in advance that I would lose, I don’t feel like doing that" - Wout van Aert to skip World and European time trials

After his bronze medal at the recent Paris 2024 Olympic Games in the individual time trial, Wout van Aert once again proved his capabilities against the clock. Don't expect to see the Belgian at the upcoming European Championships or World Championships time trial though.

“After the Vuelta, my preference is for the road race at the European Championships in Limburg and the road race at the World Championships in Zurich," Van Aert says in quotes collected by HLN. "In our opinion, adding the World Championship time trial would be too much of a good thing."

"That may sound strange, in a period of three weeks, but in terms of training, adding such a time trial is completely different. Due to the three-week gap between the Vuelta and the World Championship road race, I will have to train hard during that period and it is too short notice and it requires too much focus to also add the World Championship time trial," he continues. "After the Vuelta, I will and want to focus one hundred percent two more times to be as good as possible. That will be more than enough after such a tough and busy summer. The EC time trial doesn’t fit anyway because it’s already on the Wednesday after the Vuelta. Starting there and knowing in advance that I would lose to Ganna, I don’t feel like doing that. And to be at my best in the WC time trial, there’s not enough time after the Vuelta.”

Although a tough decision, Van Aert and Team Visma | Lease a Bike are confident the choice made has been the right one. "After the Vuelta, time trials will disappear from view for Wout for a while," says Visma coach Mathieu Heijboer. "Wout really needs to recover after the Vuelta and then those specific time trial training sessions come at an inconvenient time."

For Belgium, whilst the loss of Van Aert is obviously noticeable, having a time trialist such as Remco Evenepoel to rest hopes on, does somewhat lessen the blow.