If doubts about van Aert’s form had lingered after an only moderately successful spring Classics campaign, his performance in the Giro d’Italia – where he won a stage, finished on the podium of two others and ranked third in the points classification – put them to rest. But most impressive in the race was his long ride in the penultimate stage, in which he waited for Visma’s leader Simon Yates and then rode long and hard in front of him for 16 of the final 20km to seal his comeback GC victory. He then rode a big lead-out in the final stage to help another teammate, Olav Kooij, win the bunch sprint.
At his best, van Aert is a game-changer as he can ride in almost any terrain, including on steep slopes when necessary, as he did for Jonas Vingegaard in his two Tour de France victories. He can also sprint with the best, as his green jersey victory in the 2022 Tour demonstrated. In a way, van Aert’s broad skillset often puts him in a predicament, as individual goals compete with team requirements for his time and energy. This year, he will probably have to devote most of his attention to helping Vingegaard in his battle against odds-on favorite and three-time Tour winner Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates–XRG).
As illustrated in the Critérium du Dauphiné, the Slovenian is currently significantly stronger than his Danish rival, who will need all the help he can muster. That doesn’t mean van Aert won’t have the freedom to go for stage wins when the opportunity presents itself, either in a bunch sprint or on a hilly or medium-mountain stage ready-made for breakaways. The 23-year-old Kooij, who has won five races so far this year, is apparently not riding in the Tour, paving the way for van Aert to go for green again.
But it won’t be easy because he will be going against most of the best sprinters in the world, including Tim Merlier (Soudal Quick-Step), Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) and last year’s Škoda Green Jersey winner, Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty). Van Aert won nine Tour stages between 2029 and 2022, but none since then, so he’ll be very eager to taste champagne again.
On the other hand, there are also some other very talented puncheurs in the race, such as arch-rival Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck), who was very impressive in the Dauphiné, without winning a stage; 22-year-old Thibau Nys (Lidl-Trek); and Kévin Vauquelin (Arkéa–B&B Hotels), who just finished second in the Tour de Suisse to João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates–XRG), to name just as few.
According to IDL Pro Cycling, tweaks to the points classification system, in which a certain number of points – 50, 30 or 20 – are awarded to stage winner, appears to favor the puncheurs over the sprinters this year. The publication reports that 11 stages have been designated as so-called Category 1 and 2, in which the maximum number of points, 50, are given to the winner. These include stage 2, which finishes with a final kilometer with a gradient at over 5%, stage 4, which features five categorized climbs in the final 50 km; and stage 6, which ends on the Mur-de-Bretagne (2.1km @ 6.5%, with ramps up to 13.4%).
I don’t see sprinters fastening their shoes for those stages. Ast least four other stages in the race also give puncheurs such as van Aert a good chance to win, including the final stage, which includes three climbs of the Côte de la Butte Montmartre (1.1km @ 5.9%, with a max of 9.6%). I can’t see sprinters who have already ridden more than 3,200km mustering the will and legs to race against the likes of van Aert and van der Poel.
But van Aert’s main task will be to support Vingegaard on the lower slopes of mountains and to up the pace whenever and wherever the team wants to tire the legs of its rivals, notably UAE Team Emirates–XRG. So he will be very visible in the Tour, either on his own behalf or for the team, which can only make it a more exciting race.
