Bingo!
He's trying to be on top of his game basically a whole year, and he generally even succeeds in that. But the price is the biggest classics, or the lack of it, if you know what I mean.
Now, we had some riders in the past who could do this thing regularly, year in - year out. We had one rider who was doing this for the last 20 years, but even he needed to calculate, and time his peak twice a year, in April and September.
Back to Van Aert, he really needs to forget about peaking for the Tour. I mean he should come good, but not absolutely the best. Cause the Tour is not the race that will define his career. Look at other classics big names: Boonen, Cancellara, Bettini, Gilbert, they were not obsessed with the Tour at all, some were not riding, some were riding good, some were very good, but their absolute best was reserved for one day monuments and the worlds. Heck even Valverde being also a GC rider, didn't considered the Tour as important as some other races, in which he had better chances.