Several sprinters have left the Tour de France already amidst a very tough edition with stages ridden at a very hard pace. Caleb Ewan has abandoned the race yesterday, and it is now revealed how this came to be with harsh words from the team CEO.
“You don't get out of the Tour that way. He just hung his head. In a way I can't say a good word about. A real champion lifts his team, he doesn't do this," team CEO Sébastien Heulot told Het Nieuwsblad. It is said the team had given up on supporting him on stage 12, but Jasper de Buyst himself dropped back and rode almost the entire day in Ewan who was dropped in the early kilometers, making it home 37 minutes down on Ion Izagirre.
Stage 13 had a short and flat start, but as soon as the road tilted up the Australian was dropped from the peloton. The team later on had Florian Vermeersch and Frederik Frison wait for him, but the abandon came afterwards. “And the moment Caleb finally gets to them, he just gives up. Then you have absolutely no respect for your teammates.”
“He was totally unmotivated. Jasper De Buyst and sports director Marc Wauters in the support car had to 'save' him the stage before (stage 12, ed.). And yet Caleb criticized everything and everyone. On the team, on his teammates, on the staff, on the sporting management, it didn't stop. He felt every time that he did not get enough support. While his own sprint was below par," Heulot concluded.
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