Former world champion on UCI punishing Wout Van Aert with a super-low starting position in Liévin: "National coaches should decide who they put in which row"
CyclocrossThursday, 06 February 2025 at 09:11
Even though he never came close to threatening Mathieu van der Poel's seventh world title last Sunday, Wout Van Aert still rode impressive World Championships, after all he was the only one able to keep up with MVDP from the distance. Had he started from the front row, could he have won in Liévin? We'll never know. But it's definitely something to think about for the UCI, who want to award "pure" cyclocrosser who regularly compete in World Cup, yet is it worth the sacrifice at a competitive level?
Former cyclocross world champion Niels Albert provides his view of this dilemma in Het Laatse Nieuws column:"It was the big question before, during and after the World Championship: should Wout van Aert have been given a better starting position? At the moment, the regulations protect the pure cyclo-crossers and if I have to choose, that will remain the case. You don’t want ten road racers suddenly starting on the front row next year because they also feel like doing the Cyclo-cross World Championships."
"On the other hand: Wout is not just a road racer. The UCI should take his merits for the sport into account a bit more," the former rider believes. "Now they only look at the cyclocross points he has collected, but they could also have weighed his road points."
"On the other hand: at whose expense do you let Wout move up? Those other guys have been racing all season for their starting position. Maybe Wout should have raced a bit more. One extra World Cup round could have made a difference. Wout knew that this is the rule."
According to Albert, the coin has two sides and it's not too clear which should be favored. "But that's exactly why we really need to think about the starting regulations. Times have changed. You're increasingly seeing top riders who only ride a limited program in the winter. A solution could be to give each country the starting positions it deserves, but that the national coaches can decide who they put in which row."
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- This is pretty much a low bar for a star rider. Domestiques from other teams got higher GC rankings than him. Either he has to really train for those 1 hour climb or give up on GC hope altogether. Not a fan of Pidcock, but I think he's definitely capable of doing better if he really trained for long climbs, which his coach said he didn't. Best of luck to him.
KerisVroom05-06-2025 - Nuh, realistically, Jonas is the only main rival unless some accidents befall Tadej.KerisVroom05-06-2025
- I just simply don't believe team orders were at fault. In what world would a pink jersey leader knowingly throw away their lead just to follow team orders? Del Toro surely knew the gap to Yates was growing and he was going to lose his lead. So either Del Toro didn't have the legs or he was stupid and listened to alleged team orders to only follow Carapaz. It simply does not make sense - I mean even if the team orders were true, Del Toro shouldn't take it literally e.g. if Carapaz crashed and all the other top ten riders went 3mins up the road, would Del Toro really be stupid enough to "follow team orders" and stick with Carapaz? This is an exaggerated example, but it is exactly what Del Toro did with Yates. Del Toro only has himself to blame - if someone is threatening your lead, you chase, it shouldn't take team orders to tell you to do that!Pogboom05-06-2025
- Chris Froome...who cares yet he gets top billing here!frieders305-06-2025
- "The idea was we’d race to win every day – or every day that suited me – and do the best GC I could." It was supposed to be "either or", not "and". The dreams of GC glory are confounded by the lack of recovery. He should have stuck to stage wins.abstractengineer04-06-2025
- There are three GT winners in that group and all different onesabstractengineer04-06-2025
- Nobody, it aint the TDFabstractengineer04-06-2025
- RIP Mustafa Ayyorkun.
santiagobenites04-06-2025 - From what I can gather, seems the DS had drilled into Del Toro before the race and again at the start of the long climb that he must mark Carapaz. Imperfect info made it difficult for the DS to directly tell Del Toro to close on Yates before the end of the climb, so it was mostly left to Del Toro's unexperienced judgement, who may have been near his limit anyways. In the end, probably either one could have lead the chase, but then would have come in third, while helping the other to first. Great execution of a great plan by Visma in Wout getting on top of the climb in advance and Yates being able to get that separation that caused the stalemate behind him. Also, in hindsight, big mistake by both EF and UAE in letting the break and Wout get so far out.Meeper04-06-2025
- Don't think Carapaz and Del Toro could have reeled him back in once Yates got to Wout; too big of an engine. The lead would have been stretched long enough to prevent them from closing the gap at the end.Meeper04-06-2025
Yah let’s let the guy cut in line. Forget the hard work others did to merit being in those places. Let’s relegate one of the hard earned position holders to the row behind because some super star with little participation during the season decides to show up. Yes we all wanted a good battle between the 2. It was 100% possible but wouts team had him focused elsewhere. Chapeaux to MVDP for earning his start and a great season