It seemed as if his climbing had improved, but he only won stage 15 because Tadej Pogačar – who had been racing on his wheel – let him win. More telling, during the race, he was often dropped on significant climbs and had to use the ensuing flat and/or downhill sections to catch up to the other GC riders.
A year of sunshine and shadow
Like his Tour de France, Evenepoel’s first year with Red Bull was a mix of success and disappointment. He won a few minor races at the start of the year and won the Amstel Gold Race, but he finished third in the Tour of Flanders and Liège-Bastogne-Liège. Then came the Tour and his second place, 6:26 behind Pogačar.
He then won the Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec, his fourth consecutive time trial world championship and the European road race championship, but he finished a disappointing 12th in the world championship road race and fourth in Il Lombardia, beaten 1:20 by the rider who might just keep him off the Tour podium next year, Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM).
Though it was a very mixed bag, Evenepoel said that he is pleased with how the season went. “Long, but overall beautiful,” he told Het Laatste Nieuws. “With a few ups and downs, but fortunately the ups outweighed the downs.”
He admitted that, “The world championship road race and Lombardy weren’t great – we will certainly discuss that internally soon. And I was left with my most miserable feeling at the UAE Tour. I really wasn’t good there.” He finished 10th in that race, 2:08 behind del Toro.
I think losing the world championship road race and Il Lombardia were major disappointments. That’s why he went on a training ride of over seven hours last week, while most other riders were already winding down. “I felt like I had fallen short in the final hour over the past few weeks, both in the world championship road race and in Il Lombardia,” he explained. “That’s why I wanted to fit in another long endurance ride like that. I just felt like it. And being in that European champion’s jersey… it gave me morale.”
In other words, he was in need of some endorphins. Despite the new training regime and the lost kilos – which did not affect his power output at all, he said after the Tour – his performances overall were only a small improvement on the “fat” Remco. In the 2024 race, the only other Tour he finished, he came more than 9 minutes behind the Slovenian. On the other hand, Pogačar rode several stages this year in support of his teammate Isaac del Toro, which no doubt cost him time.
The weight of believing
But Evenepoel continues to believe, and he has already made changes to how he will train in 2027. “What is certain is that I will not enter competition as early as I did this year,” he said, referring to his January races in Mallorca. “As a newcomer to the team, that was somewhat normal. I wanted to prove myself, integrate into the group as well as possible, and win as quickly as possible. Next year will be different.”
He went on to say that he will follow last year’s training concept. “What we have also felt and learned is that I need very good preparation periods for my major goals,” he said. “So, we are going to schedule those even more specifically.”
The problem in 2027 will again be his weight. Tim Heemskerk, Evenepoel’s coach at Red Bull–BORA–hansgrohe, told Het Laatste Nieuws, “Trying to get his weight down after the Classics campaign was a huge task, but he handled it very well and clearly benefited from it in the Tour. That has also been a lesson and an area to work on with next year in mind. If you want to compete in this generation against absolute top riders like Pogačar, but also del Toro, Seixas and the rest, you have to be absolutely spot on in that area.”
Heemskerk went on to say that Evenepoel was a “training animal”. “But sometimes, less is more,” he added. “When he feels good, he can sometimes ride harder than he should during a VO2 max session.”
That overeager attitude to training is surely a result of his huge ambition and has been a contentious issue. “I’ve spoken to him about it a few times: ‘If the session says 450 watts, you don’t need to start pushing 500 or 600. Otherwise, you’re systematically training in a different way’,” Heemskerk said.
I hope Evenepoel wins the Tour one day because I admire his ambition and his willingness to talk frankly about his successes and failures. And he may win it next year. With a whopping 71 km of flat time trialing and less climbing than usual in the race, Evenepoel may never have a better chance to beat Pogačar and Vingegaard in the Tour.
In this year’s Tour time trial, he beat the Slovenian by 28 seconds over 26.1 km. Let’s say that he takes a full minute from Pogačar in the two ITTs next year. Will that be enough? I doubt it. Still, it will be exciting to watch him try.