{"id":569671,"date":"2026-03-28T09:21:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T09:21:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/569671\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T09:21:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T09:21:10","slug":"it-may-well-turn-out-that-hes-a-one-day-rider-former-manager-patrick-lefevere-questions-remco-evenepoels-racing-priorities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/569671\/","title":{"rendered":"‘It may well turn out that he’s a one-day rider’ \u2013 Former manager Patrick Lefevere questions Remco Evenepoel’s racing priorities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former Soudal-QuickStep boss Patrick Lefevere has said that Remco Evenepoel<\/a> might be better suited to the Classics than stage racing.<\/p>\n

The veteran team manager, who retired at the end of the 2024 season, discussed his former team leader in a Het Laatste Nieuws<\/a> roundtable discussion, with Evenepoel’s racing priorities among the main topics of conversation.<\/p>\n

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During the winter, it had been rumoured that Evenepoel was considering racing Milan-San Remo and the Tour of Flanders this spring. However, he dismissed the idea of taking on those races earlier this year.<\/p>\n

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Instead, Evenepoel, who has won the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a and finished on the podium of the Tour de France, is currently racing the Volta a Catalunya.<\/p>\n

Lefevere surprisingly drew a comparison with another of his former riders, Sylvain Chavanel<\/a>, a French rider once hailed as a stage racing prospect. However, his biggest successes came in one-day races, including wins at Dwars door Vlaanderen and Brabantse Pijl.<\/p>\n

“I had a good example in my own team: Sylvain Chavanel, a Frenchman. He was the new guy. He was supposed to win the Tour. He turned pro at 20. He gave it a go \u2013 he once finished in the top 10 [Chavanel’s best Tour de France result was 19th \u2013 Ed].<\/p>\n

“But what did he actually win? In truth, Sylvain was a one-day rider, as may well turn out to be the case with Remco, too.”<\/p>\n

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Lefevere said that Evenepoel, who has won two editions of Li\u00e8ge-Bastogne-Li\u00e8ge, three of the Donostia Klasikoa, and one of Brabantse Pijl, “should have been in San Remo and should also have ridden Flanders or E3”.<\/p>\n

“I’ve told him once or twice, but well… He’s so focussed \u2013 and you have to be if you want to perform.<\/p>\n

“He’s won the Vuelta, yes. But there are still two others out there. I’ve seen Jonas Vingegaard<\/a> in action at Paris-Nice. I wish him good luck.”<\/p>\n

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Evenepoel is targeting the Tour de France<\/a> once again this year. He’ll co-lead Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe with Florian Lipowitz in July as he aims to take on Tadej Poga\u010dar and Jonas Vingegaard once again.<\/p>\n

Before then, the Ardennes Classics are on his calendar, while later in the year he’ll head to Canada for the Road World Championships<\/a> and a bid at a record-equalling fourth world time trial title as well as a second world road title.<\/p>\n

Despite Evenepoel’s current focus lying largely with stage racing, Lefevere said that he still has time to compete in other Classics.<\/p>\n

“He’s got time, hasn’t he? He\u2019s 26 now. If he gives himself another two years’ chance to win the Tour,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Or then again\u2026 I think if everyone stays healthy, [Poga\u010dar] and Vingegaard are going to be a very tough pair to beat. And he\u2019s got competition within his own team as well. He didn\u2019t use to have that.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Soudal-QuickStep boss Patrick Lefevere has said that Remco Evenepoel might be better suited to the Classics than…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":569672,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,85],"class_list":["post-569671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=569671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569671\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/569672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=569671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=569671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=569671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}