{"id":552670,"date":"2026-03-22T06:00:26","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T06:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/552670\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T06:00:26","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T06:00:26","slug":"i-saw-him-on-the-ground-next-to-me-after-the-crash-and-the-next-time-i-saw-him-was-on-the-podium-wout-van-aerts-on-a-chaotic-milan-san-remo-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/552670\/","title":{"rendered":"‘I saw him on the ground next to me after the crash, and the next time I saw him was on the podium’: Wout van Aerts on a chaotic Milan-San Remo"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wout van Aert\u2019s string of bad luck continued at Milan-San Remo, with the Belgian getting caught up in a crash behind world champion Tadej Pogacar. That didn\u2019t stop either rider from making it to the podium at the Italian Monument, but the two riders had very different roads to the finish line.<\/p>\n

While Pogacar was up quite quickly and chasing back to the front, Wout had to wait for a bike change before he, and his teammates, could get back into the race.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst with the crash, and then it took quite a while before I could continue on a new bike,\u201d van Aert said, \u201cI had a lot of bad luck.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way the guys reacted\u2026 they stayed with me and brought me back,\u201d van Aert added \u201cThe only thing I could do was go for the best possible result. It tastes sweeter when you finish on the podium than just off it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Photo: Sirotti
\n\u201cI saw him on the ground. The next time I saw him was on the podium.\u201d<\/p>\n

Van Aert knew that Pogcar was in the crash as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cI saw him on the ground next to me after the crash, and the next time I saw him was on the podium,\u201d van Aert shared, reports Wielerflits, with a bit of awe. \u201cI have no idea what he achieved, but it must have been impressive. It was a pretty hard crash. The fact that he still managed to come to the front is impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Van Aert admitted that the crash stayed on his mind for the rst of the race.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t until the last two or three kilometers that I realized I was still in contention for the podium,\u201d van Aert shared. In that context, \u201cThird place felt like more an achievement than a near miss.\u201d<\/p>\n

An achievement, but not a win.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u201cIt never feels like winning when you finish third.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if it is the world champion, and potentially the greatest cyclist of all time, that you lose to.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is always special to stand next to him,\u201d Van Aert said of Pogacar, \u201cEspecially with his special jersey.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wout van Aert\u2019s string of bad luck continued at Milan-San Remo, with the Belgian getting caught up in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":552156,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[212974,49,48,635,166274,82,1422,12290],"class_list":["post-552670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-2026-milan-san-remo","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-milan-san-remo","tag-sports","tag-tadej-pogacar","tag-wout-van-aert"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=552670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552670\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/552156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=552670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=552670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=552670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}