In the pages of Het Nieuwsblad on Friday morning, QuickStep-AlphaVinyl manager Patrick Lefevere suggested it might be a poisoned chalice. Outside the team bus in Camargo, directeur sportif Klaas Lodewyck even entertained the idea of giving it away. Try telling that to Remco Evenepoel, who paired his red jersey with matching helmet, glasses and face mask when he reported for duty ahead of stage 7 of the Vuelta a España.
Lefevere and Lodewyck are, perhaps understandably, in the business of downplaying expectations, but Evenepoel hardly seemed burdened by the thought of leading a Grand Tour for the first time in his career as he moved through the mixed zone on Friday morning.
Then again, Evenepoel’s entire cycling life has played out in the glare of an intense spotlight. In April 2017, his renown as a footballer was already enough to persuade a local television station to broadcast a report from one his very first junior races. The audience is bigger nowadays, but leading the Vuelta is simply the latest episode in a long-running reality show about a young man compelled to do his growing up in public.
“I had a good sleep. I think the weather conditions yesterday made me tired, so I had a good sleep,” Evenepoel said. “When I woke up, I immediately looked at the two red helmets that the team had prepared for me. It was a morning I will never forget.”
Out on the road, Evenepoel’s first outing in the maillot rojo proved even more straightforward than he could have wished. The early break went the distance, there were no frissons on the category 1 haul up the Puerto de San Glorio, and the sprinters’ teams performed the bulk of the chasing.
QuickStep-AlphaVinyl could spend much of the afternoon sitting in the wheels and Evenepoel rolled into Cistierna in the peloton with his overall lead safely intact. Rudy Molard remains second at 21 seconds, with Enric Mas a further seven seconds back in third, and three-time winner Primoz Roglic is still fourth at 1:01.
“For us, it was the perfect scenario,” Evenepoel said after he collected a fresh red jersey on the podium. “I think that two teams were able to control the race and we didn’t have to do anything, so everybody could try to recover from yesterday’s stage.
“In the end, everybody was doing well on the team. We were controlled and relaxed. It’s a pity for the teams working in the front that they couldn’t take the breakaway back, but a really strong group stayed away. It was quite a good day…
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