Wout van Aert has downplayed the prospect of emulating his achievements at last year’s Tour de France, when he claimed the points jersey and three stage victories while helping Jumbo-Visma teammate Jonas Vingegaard to final overall victory.
The Belgian has also voiced disappointment at how his and Vingegaard’s relationship was portrayed in the recently-released Netflix documentary ‘Tour de France: Unchained.’
“I am someone who likes to believe that there are almost no limits, but when it comes to last year’s Tour, it should not be the ambition to do even better,” Van Aert said in an interview with Sporza. “That Tour was exceptional. I realise that and the team realises that.”
Van Aert repeated his earlier affirmation that he would not make a target of the green jersey from the start of the 2023 Tour de France. “Winning green was nice and important to me, but the best thing in this sport is to cross the finish line first,” he said. “The points classification sometimes gets in the way of stage victories.”
Van Aert insisted, however, that his personal ambitions were compatible with Vingegaard’s title defence. The Belgian has won stages in each of his four Tour appearances while helping his leaders finish on the overall podium on each occasion.
“I’ve been asked for a number of years whether that can be combined. I can only say: look at the races of previous years,” said Van Aert, who downplayed the apparent tensions with Vingegaard that were documented in the Netflix series.
“It is quite disturbing that stories were placed in the documentary that weren’t there. For me, the series is focused on commotion,” he said.
“Jonas and I are best mates. It focuses on moments where it’s hard to make the right choice, but there are also so many moments where we supported each other and worked together. It’s a shame that that was taken out.”
Tour de Suisse
Van Aert was speaking as he returned to racing at the Tour de Suisse after two months of training. The Belgian finished third in Sunday’s opening time trial but said afterwards that there are still more improvements to be made ahead of July.
The Belgian came home 10 seconds down on stage 1 winner Stefan Küng (Groupama-FDJ) during the time trial in Einsiedeln. The 12.7km ride was his first race since Paris-Roubaix, with training camps at altitude in Sierra Nevada and, most recently, the Swiss Alps, coming in the intervening period.
In Switzerland, Van Aert said that the wind had an effect on his ride…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at CyclingNews RSS Feed…