This year, one team has been especially affected by riders falling off their bikes. I’m talking, of course, about Visma–Lease a Bike, who lost their two superstars, Jonas Vingegaard and Wout van Aert, for much of the season because of spring crashes.
Vingegaard’s last outing, and his final appearance of the year, resulted in a victory in the Tour of Poland. He will be back at full strength next year. Van Aert’s last outing, and his final appearance of the year, was a crash on stage 16 of the Vuelta a España, a crash that ended what would have been a remarkable comeback and a performance that would have been one of the highlights of the race and a part of cycling legend.
At the time of the crash, van Aert had won three stages and had an insurmountable lead, 291 points to 182, over his only real rival in the race for the green jersey, Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceuninck). With only one real sprint stage left, that jersey was as good as his. He had also taken over the virtual lead in the King of the Mountains (KOM) competition from Jay Vine of UAE Team Emirates. He was back in top form and set to make his mark on another Grand Tour.
But all that vanished in a split second, with about 50km left to ride in the 185.1km stage. As he was descending from the second of three categorized climbs in the stage, the Collada Llomena, on a rain-slick surface, he lost control of his bike in a sharp curve and crashed for the second time that day. Felix Engelhardt (Jayco-AlUla) had just crashed in front of him and Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates) fell behind him, but those two riders continued riding on.
Van Aert fell on some rocks at the side of the road and badly injured his left knee. He got back on his bike and tried to race on, but the injury proved too serious, and he quickly dismounted. He was treated by a staff member at the scene, but it was in vain. The accident not only put an end to his quest for the green jersey, but also to his year.
“Wout van Aert will not race any more this season,” the team announced on its website the next day. “[He] needs time to recover from his crash in the Vuelta a España. He suffered a serious knee injury that will require intensive care.”
He had also been looking forward to riding in the UCI Road Race World Championships in Zurich at the end of September and would have come into that competition not only in great form, but also more rested than most of his competition because of the time he had lost due to his crash in the Dwars door Vlaanderen in late March.
He will be missed at the Worlds by his Belgian teammate Remco Evenepoel. Van Aert was invaluable in helping him win the Olympics road race. One wonders how, and if, this bad-luck season will affect van Aert’s riding in the future.
More than that, however, the Vuelta and the race for the green jersey were much poorer because of his absence. Groves went on to win the green jersey, by 226 points to 140 over red jersey winner Primož Roglič (Red Bull–BORA–Hansgrohe), with another non-sprinter, Max Poole (dsm-firmenich PostNL), in third, at 118 points.
The presence of two non-sprinters on the Škoda Green Jersey podium illustrates the weakness of the sprinting competition in this Vuelta, which had some 65,000m of altitude gain throughout the three weeks. The only other sprinter to win a bunch sprint in the race was the 21-year-old Czech rider Pavel Bittner (dsm-firmenich PostNL), who finished sixth in the points classification, with 106 points.
This shouldn’t take the gloss off of Groves’ victory. He also won three stages and proved faster than van Aert, twice edging him out in a bunch sprint. But the up-and-down nature of the race had been to the advantage of van Aert, who is the better climber.
Asked after that fateful stage 16 if he had expected to win the Škoda Green Jersey, Groves said, “Not at all. Wout had such a convincing lead in the points classification. Not to mention that he’s also leading in the polka-dot [KOM jersey]. I know that he abandoned, and it’s a pretty terrible way to wear the green [jersey].”
It is also a terrible way to lose the Škoda Green Jersey.
