Former Soudal-QuickStep team boss Patrick Lefevere has revealed that he contacted Juan Ayuso while he was still a UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider as a potential replacement if Remco Evenepoel left during his time in charge, which ended at the end of 2024.
Lefevere started making moves in the GC rider market after continued interest poured in for Evenepoel from Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe owner Ralph Denk, who eventually managed to lure the Belgian away one year before his Soudal-QuickStep contract expired this past summer.
“I sold Remco’s project to Soudal for five years. And then, after three years, the trouble started,” said Lefevere in a recent extensive interview on La Dernière Heure Les Sports‘ Radio Peloton podcast.
With that in mind, it was the rising Spanish GC rider whom Lefevere had in mind as his contingency plan in the early 2020s, but by 2022, Ayuso had already locked up his future until 2028 – until the issues of last year arose and he departed for Lidl-Trek.
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