Teams & Riders The Remco Evenepoel is the next Eddy Merckx thread

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Feb 20, 2012
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It's UAE Tour, like just chill the next 2 days and try to win on Jebel Hafeet. If you think podium is still possible throw yourself in intermediate sprints when the break is 1 or 2 guys.
 
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Jul 23, 2025
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It's not whether it's fixible or not, but the fact that others today, who "should" be beneath him, let alone Pogacar, showed up and performed. This seems to me, by now, to be a physiological problem or limit. Otherwise those who are managing him at Bora are as incompetent as those at Soudal.
I don't think it is a problem.

He is just not good enough.
 
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Sep 6, 2022
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I 100% agree with the bolded. He can be mentally very strong even when on the back foot (Tour 2024, although I disagree that dropping minutes on the toughest mountain stages was some historical feat, Amstel Gold Race last year, etc.), but he more often than not completely collapses when someone attacks him unexpectedly or his legs don't respond the way he thinks they will. Giro 2021, Vuelta 2023, LBL 2025, Tour 2025, this...he has to figure out how to avoid the collapse. He went to the 2023 Vuelta for example fully believing he would defend his 2022 title. Then Roglic attacked unexpectedly, he didn't feel great, and Vuelta over.

In the two major exceptions I can think of - 2024 Tour and AGR 2025 - I think there were big psychological factors at play. In the 2024 Tour, he wasn't expected to win. Pogi and Vingegaard were world beaters, he'd had a crash, it was his first Tour, he hadn't won the 2023 Vuelta, etc. In AGR 2025, he was newly back from an offseason crash, so the stakes were low.

When the stakes are high and he believes he should win, he seems to need 100% control and cannot handle the unexpected.

I don't think that is unfixable. He has the mental strength, he has physical strength, he has displayed it all at the same time, he can get there. But he needs to understand and accept the issue and embrace the work to address it. Step 1 is acknowledging that he has severely underperformed in stage races relative to his talent, expectations, and pay, and that responsibility for that sits with himself. Then dig into the why - OK, a lot of it is sudden collapses and highly variable performance. OK, what's driving that? And so on.
Yeah sure good points you bring but say this is what needs to be done, how do you convince him he needs to look at it? His modus operandi seems to be to blame external factors whenever it goes sideways for him. His biggest ‘weak spot’ isn’t what you point out he needs to work on. His biggest blind spot is not seeing that he has a problem of attitude.
 
Feb 24, 2020
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Yeah sure good points you bring but say this is what needs to be done, how do you convince him he needs to look at it? His modus operandi seems to be to blame external factors whenever it goes sideways for him. His biggest ‘weak spot’ isn’t what you point out he needs to work on. His biggest blind spot is not seeing that he has a problem of attitude.
He is not looking for excuses he said today. He didn't blame external factors. His problem of attitude is that his character doesn't allow him to be defensive or to acknowledge that he is still building up towards his climbing legs. He probably knows this but his recent successes and the responsability he feels to perform for his new team makes it difficult for him. Of course he can win any TT any time but he needs to learn that being top ar climbing requires a different attitude.
 
Jul 23, 2025
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He literally said in his interview: "I don't have to look for excuses, I just wasn't good enough". 😂
Yep, after he made a ton of excuses.

His words:

"I don't think I digested yesterday's effort at all. I didn't have the best night either; I woke up from the heat. But ultimately, I can't make excuses."
 
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Jun 1, 2015
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Yeah he clearly gave some excuses then said “no excuses.” But obviously there are explanations, whether we want to call them excuses or not. He is as much a 2 minutes slower than Tiberi climber as he is a genuine threat to Pogacar on a climb.
 
Jul 23, 2025
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Yeah. A reporter asks, what went wrong. He says I slept bad but that’s no excuse. Literally saying there’s no excuse.
After making a ton of excuses.

From my perspective, there is an important distinction between clearly stating “no excuses” and providing several justifications before ultimately concluding with “no excuses.”
 
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Sep 12, 2022
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After making a ton of excuses.

From my perspective, there is an important distinction between clearly stating “no excuses” and providing several justifications before ultimately concluding with “no excuses.”
To me he’s just spitballing because he’s being honest and since he’s honest he says there’s no good excuse though. Which he means.
 
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Sep 5, 2016
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I hope so too, but the route doesn't really help him with this. He's targeted quite hard too anyway, and his team isn't good enough for this here. That hill before intermediate sprint 2 is basically 500m at 10-12%, the rest is shallow. The one after goes up and down a lot, I don't really see anywhere to attack.

Unless you do like Tim Cahill says and attack from the start, but that's extremely far out, who is going to work with him?
Attacking from the start likely won't work , let Bahrain burn a little energy, UAE has a reason to burn it a little, Visma has multiple reasons to work really hard and Astana also have reasons to be on the front, Bora has Remco is 1:44 off the pace..and the guys there supposed to be helping and terrible Finn Fisher-Black is riding with a bag of cement on his back at 11 and a half minutes back.
Next Boro rider is 18 minutes back, guys are of no help.
O'Connor and Porter didn't totally explode, so some allies for Plapp..something crazy for removal of 1 and 2 but Tejada is a little vulnerable, guy is a good rider, lots of guys nibbling at his podium place.
I expect Trek to not fully respect or support Gee, Alpecin doesn't need to race entire time hard, I would expect them to bring it and try and take 1 position or 2 positions in sprint points, almost nobody has a reason to work with Alpecin.
They raced outstanding today, including jumping out of the bunch to get 3rd place sprint points, the 2 breakaway guys took the most.. Milan was asleep.
I watch the race hoping for something good for Isaac Del Toro but Antonio Tiberi is quality and he is proven. Tiberi has had lots of good results over last couple of years , lots of top 10s and he always doesn't embarrass himself in time trials..I love Ciccone also and if Tiberi was at Trek they could win GTs this year.. Oh well. Finn Fisher- Black is completely binary, he is either on or he is off, let's hope he can put a couple of decent days together to help Remco.
 
Feb 24, 2020
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After making a ton of excuses.

From my perspective, there is an important distinction between clearly stating “no excuses” and providing several justifications before ultimately concluding with “no excuses.”
He started by saying that there are no excuses, that he was not good enough. He then gave a fair assessment of how he felt that day. What's wrong with that? What do you want him to say? Just say "No excuses. I am bad." and than shut up? He says what he thinks out loud, always, which is what the media wants to hear also. It's part of what makes him who he is
 
Jul 23, 2025
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He started by saying that there are no excuses, that he was not good enough. He then gave a fair assessment of how he felt that day. What's wrong with that? What do you want him to say? Just say "No excuses. I am bad." and than shut up? He says what he thinks out loud, always, which is what the media wants to hear also. It's part of what makes him who he is
Yeah, we have to agree to disagree.

Like I said, full of excuses, not good enough.
 
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May 27, 2022
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All I'm going to see before I leave this subject, is that when the cameras cut to Remco getting dropped, I wasn't shocked at all. These collapses against the top riders aren't new. I like Remco for what it's worth, one of the all time great time trailists and a great one day rider, but as a GC rider, he's massively overatted and his record proves it.
 
Jul 23, 2025
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All I'm going to see before I leave this subject, is that when the cameras cut to Remco getting dropped, I wasn't shocked at all. These collapses against the top riders aren't new. I like Remco for what it's worth, one of the all time great time trailists and a great one day rider, but as a GC rider, he's massively overatted and his record proves it.
Yeah, this is it.

An all time great TT.

Massive overrated as a GC rider.
 
Feb 27, 2023
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Regarding his weight. There is no such thing as spring classics weight vs TdF weight. If he has the discipline to be at his 2022 Vuelta weight he would be a much better rider overall. However, the way he is now, he can only win races where there is little to no climbing, i.e., nothing of the sort of races he is proclaiming he wants to win.
 
Feb 27, 2023
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Too much is said about weight, there's no way that alone explains dropping 2 minutes because it's like 3% steeper than ideal
Sure today it appears to have been an extremely bad for him. But this does not change the fact that he is simply overweight if he wants to be competitive on steeper slopes
 

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