Remco Evenepoel is the new road bike world champion and continues to follow in the footsteps of one of the greatest legends in his sport. But the history of this world championship is delivered by someone who does not even finish the race.
Remco Evenepoel put his hands in front of his face, shook his head and, after an impressive triumph, rolled jubilantly across the finish line. Overshadowed by the scandal surrounding co-favorite Mathieu van der Poel, the young Belgian star stormed to the world title Down Under for the first time. The 22-year-old professional cyclist won the road race just two weeks after his Vuelta success after 266.9 kilometers in Wollongong, Australia, ahead of Frenchman Christophe Laporte and Australian Michael Matthews. The talent of the century is thus moving more and more in the footsteps of his legendary compatriot Eddy Merckx, who also won his first world title in 1967 at the age of 22.
It was an impressive show from Evenepoel, who succeeded Frenchman Julian Alaphilippe, who had last triumphed in 2020 and 2021. With 72 kilometers to go, the exceptional Belgian rider pulled away from fellow favorites such as Tadej Pogacar (Slovenia), Matthews and Alaphilippe with a larger group. When the pace increased again two laps before the end, only Kazakh Alexej Luzenko was able to follow, but he was also unable to do anything against the Belgian with 26 kilometers to go. As expected, the German drivers played no role.
However, van der Poel, who had caused a scandal the night before and was arrested in the meantime for a physical attack in the hotel, caused the great excitement. There had been an altercation with two children who had knocked on his door several times. A girl’s arm was reportedly injured. The 27-year-old was charged with two counts of assault and released on bail early Sunday morning. Van der Poel has to appear in court on Tuesday. The former cross world champion still started in the road race, but gave up after just over an hour.
“It’s true, yes. There was a little argument,” van der Poel told Belgian TV station Sporza before the start. “It was about noisy neighbors and they are pretty strict here.” He went to bed early. However, many children in the corridor of his room would have found it necessary to knock on the door. “After a few times I was done with it. I didn’t ask kindly to stop. Then the police were called. I wasn’t back in my room until 4 a.m. It’s definitely not optimal. It’s a disaster, but I can’t do anything anymore change.” Above all, van der Poel was no longer a competitor to Evenepoel.
Evenepoel is already being celebrated in his home country as the new Eddy Merckx. And its development is amazing. In 2016 he was still a junior international with the Belgian soccer record champions RSC Anderlecht, and at the age of 16 he also ran the Brussels half marathon in 1:16:15 hours before the boy from Schepdaal discovered his love for cycling. Only two years later Evenepoel, whose father Patrick was also a professional cyclist for a few years, was already double world champion in the juniors. His entry into the pros with World Cup silver in the 2019 time trial was just as furious, before a serious fall on the Lombardy Tour in 2020 with a broken pelvis forced him to take a nine-month break.
The German drivers had no chance in the World Championship race. Georg Zimmermann, who was most likely to be able to place in the front, fell 74 kilometers before the finish line. So there was no medal for the Federation of German Cyclists in the elite races. On Saturday, despite a strong performance, Liane Lippert narrowly missed out on a podium place by finishing fourth in the women’s race when Annemiek van Vleuten from the Netherlands won. The 24-year-old from Friedrichshafen also finished fourth in the mixed team time trial with the German team.
