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

[Red Rick]

This was such a *** performance and serious letdown. I don’t even know what it might be. I don’t believe in “he’s not a climber”, when he won Vuelta and finished podium TDF. That’s just what some people hope. The team has no explanation why he doesn’t have the legs from Valencia, which is even more worrying. I said before let’s wait for Catalunya but not sure that will matter much. Sure he will lose some weight and have that altitude influence, but still… worrying signs, and just overall disappointing

Team saying they have no idea is completely shocking....

For me the part where they skip classics because they want to focus everything on TdF GC, then proceed to apparently not train on long climbs all winter is absolutely astounding.

 

[Berniece]

Tao Geoghegan won the Giro but obviously help him 0 % now too. Zero relevance to today thats the definition of cope.

His performance in 2024 was still better than what others did the year after. So he lost that capability completely or something is wrong

 

[AmRacer]

His performance in 2024 was still better than what others did the year after. So he lost that capability completely or something is wrong

It's gone never to be seen again, or maybe if he crashes in Itzulia again 🤔

 

[staubsauger]

Evgeni Berzin all over again.
And Evgeni actually won a proper Grand Tour with the 1994 Giro d'Italia and kinda confirmed that performance in 1995 before fading away and sinking on every proper ascend!

 

[AmRacer]

Instead of Catalunya
MSR
E3
GW
Dwars
RVV
Amstel
LBL
.
Maybe some more, he should be able to fight for the win.

 

[Red Rick]

His performance in 2024 was still better than what others did the year after. So he lost that capability completely or something is wrong

Vingegaard and Pogacar (in the Alps) also did worse, so it's not unreasonable to assume the conditions were by and large worse for crazy numbers.

 

[Salvarani]

Instead of Catalunya
MSR
E3
GW
Dwars
RVV
Amstel
LBL
.
Maybe some more, he should be able to fight for the win.

I dont think so.

He needs altitude, Catalunya, altitude... before LBL to be at his best level there.

We will see if they will have him do Amstel and Fleche before. When he won in 2023, he didnt.

I think him doing MSR, E3, GW, Dwars and RVV would be great for entertainment purposes... but maybe not good for him.

 

[AmRacer]

I dont think so.

He needs altitude, Catalunya, altitude... before LBL to be at his best level there.

We will see if they will have him do Amstel and Fleche before. When he won in 2023, he didnt.

I think him doing MSR, E3, GW, Dwars and RVV would be great for entertainment purposes... but maybe not good for him.

He should be able to get good results there, maybe winning one as well.

 

[Ulle97]

I'm a Remco fan, but I have to say I'm done with the excuses. The man is a limited climber at best.

His best GT performance left him more than 9mins behind Pogacar in TDF 24.

The amount of times we hit the proper climbs and we see him blowing up is unfair for him to endure. He is an outstanding TTer, one-day racer and brilliant at long range attacks on hilly terrain.

The man is NOT a climber. He is sacrificing results and potential victories in other races by chasing a dream of winning the Tour de France. He has ZERO chance of doing that.

Smoked in the UAE climbs, Meltdown in the Tour last year, Meltdown in the Vuelta in 23, didn't finish the Giro in 21 or 23, falls away in TDS stages once the road goes up.

Yet I hear all this tripe that he needs altitude camps, he needs to lose weight, he's not dialled in, he has no base, the AC was smashed. The man is killing himself trying to be someone he's not.

 

[Salvarani]

He should be able to get good results there, maybe winning one as well.

Maybe, who knows, but I dont think it is best strategy for him to be the best for LBL. A race that really suits and that he has won twice.

And it is probably better to do altitude, Catalunya, altitude... with the other targets he has this season as well. He needs it to improve his climbing-level. I dont think riding classics will help with that. Nor that riding classics is suitable for him. So where does he go?

This was a really disappointing race, but they would have to be clueless to just alter the spring schedule/plans for him and have him do those races imo.

 

[canina82]

I'm a Remco fan, but I have to say I'm done with the excuses. The man is a limited climber at best.

His best GT performance left him more than 9mins behind Pogacar in TDF 24.

The amount of times we hit the proper climbs and we see him blowing up is unfair for him to endure. He is an outstanding TTer, one-day racer and brilliant at long range attacks on hilly terrain.

The man is NOT a climber. He is sacrificing results and potential victories in other races by chasing a dream of winning the Tour de France. He has ZERO chance of doing that.

Smoked in the UAE climbs, Meltdown in the Tour last year, Meltdown in the Vuelta in 23, didn't finish the Giro in 21 or 23, falls away in TDS stages once the road goes up.

Yet I hear all this tripe that he needs altitude camps, he needs to lose weight, he's not dialled in, he has no base, the AC was smashed. The man is killing himself trying to be someone he's not.

Brilliant post. 100% this.

 

[Netserk]

Vingegaard and Pogacar (in the Alps) also did worse, so it's not unreasonable to assume the conditions were by and large worse for crazy numbers.

they went fast on ventoux.

hard on madeleine, but not full once they made it to jorg. but it still had a big impact on loze

and then the headwind and how vingegaard rode the next day also meant that there were no test of how strong they were

 

[staubsauger]

Evenepoel won a 2022 Vuelta a Espana where he was able to come from altitude camp in peak shape and hit the hardest 2 mountains still being super fresh. Afterwards there hardly were any true obstacles. Neither @Libertine Seguros nor @hrotha with full Spanish patriotism considered that specific edition of the Vuelta a Espana a proper Grand Tour! (Correct my if I'm wrong)
It simply was the perfect race for someone like Remco that needs to come in peak shape and fresh as daisy to a race, but has big problems to maintain that shape over 3 weeks.

He also really isn't a climber. Aubisque already has been too much. Like I said Evenepoel has sunken more often on the big mountains than Evgeni Berzin who was actually famous for totally falling apart on serious ascends. Berzin overlived the Giro d'Italia mountaine in 1994 & 1995 though, while Remco cracked on Aubisque & Tourmalet early on.


Di Luca who definitely wasn't a true climber either at least drilled Finestre & Blockhaus.


Remco needs to sort this out, but it becomes less and less possible he actually can. He's a super strong classics rider that is able to limit his losses in the high mountains to archive a podium spot in an ideal race for himself it seems. Just like in 2023 at the Tour de France.


Already looks like Pellizzari needs to pull Red Bull's chestnuts out of the fire at the 2026 Giro d'Italia first, before they seek Grand Tour success at the Tour de France.


There will be Ayuso, Seixas, Evenepoel and Lippowitz. Plus Del Torro if he doesn't need to fully sacrifice himself for Pogacar which seems entirely possible.

Ayuso is just as fragile as Evenepoel. Seixas is super young going for his Grand Tour debut. But including Del Torro those are 3 guys that look stronger for a 3 week challenge AT THIS POINT that need to crack ALL before Red Bull can think about another Tour de France podium.


Huge enhancement is necessary!

 

[peterfin]

I'm a Remco fan, but I have to say I'm done with the excuses. The man is a limited climber at best.

His best GT performance left him more than 9mins behind Pogacar in TDF 24.

The amount of times we hit the proper climbs and we see him blowing up is unfair for him to endure. He is an outstanding TTer, one-day racer and brilliant at long range attacks on hilly terrain.

The man is NOT a climber. He is sacrificing results and potential victories in other races by chasing a dream of winning the Tour de France. He has ZERO chance of doing that.

Smoked in the UAE climbs, Meltdown in the Tour last year, Meltdown in the Vuelta in 23, didn't finish the Giro in 21 or 23, falls away in TDS stages once the road goes up.

Yet I hear all this tripe that he needs altitude camps, he needs to lose weight, he's not dialled in, he has no base, the AC was smashed. The man is killing himself trying to be someone he's not.

I generally have the same feeling since 2025. I do think that having one big GC target a year is still ok if he doesn't sacrifice the rest of his season for it. He has (or definitely had) it in him to win the Giro. His chances to win the TdF are close to zero as long as Pogacar races but it's the most important race of the season so a podium has a lot of value too.

 

[Peyresourde]

they went fast on ventoux.

hard on madeleine, but not full once they made it to jorg. but it still had a big impact on loze

and then the headwind and how vingegaard rode the next day also meant that there were no test of how strong they were

A lot was talked about Pogacar's knee injury in the alps which explain his slight struggles, but I have no idea what was up with Vingegaard. He had his best day on Ventoux and then was weaker than expected in the Alps. Other riders like Lipowitz and Onley were quite consistent over the whole race so I don't think just external conditions were the reason. (I think he may have already somewhat given up and was already thinking about the Vuelta)

As for Evenepoel: One thing I noticed that he is often flying straight from (altitude) training but then does not get better / even worse after several races. It is not that he necessarily gets worse within a race (even in a 3 week GT). He instead seems to get worse in the 2nd and 3rd race back from training, especially if it is a stage race.

Other riders often get better in their 2nd race (e.g. Tiberi improving in UAE compared to Valencia). Of course this is just anectodal and not necessarily a fact.

 

[Netserk]

He had his best day on Ventoux and then was weaker than expected in the Alps.

how do you measure this when he didnt do a single climb full ?

youd have to segment madeleine and then try to infer from that which performance he likely was capable of

 

[Peyresourde]

This is not just my numbers, but also the visuals and gaps. I think he was not feeling good on Loze (even though the effort on Madeleine was not that extreme), otherwise he would have attacked earlier. His attack was also visually extremely weak.
On La Plagne he may have just gone for the stage and misjudged it, but I still did not have a good impression of him.

And I won't talk about tactics of the 2025 Tour in this thread, but if he really wanted to go all in he should have used a completely different strategy.

 

[Netserk]

This is not just my numbers, but also the visuals and gaps. I think he was not feeling good on Loze (even though the effort on Madeleine was not that extreme), otherwise he would have attacked earlier. His attack was also visually extremely weak.
On La Plagne he may have just gone for the stage and misjudged it, but I still did not have a good impression of him.

And I won't talk about tactics of the 2025 Tour in this thread, but if he really wanted to go all in he should have used a completely different strategy.

he was not good on loze, but the only rider you can compare him to fairly there is pogi. onley had a completely different stage in the legs

you say the others were consistent, but then keep in mind the gap to lipowitz on madeleine while the last part was with jorgensons pace

the execution on madeleine failed, but the strategy was correct. neither loze afterwards nor the aborted stage the day after allowed anything needed so a stage win was all that was left. and he nearly got it

 

[Peyresourde]

My recommended strategy on the Loze stage: He was extremely explosive last year, even so much so that his explosivity was closer to Pogacar than his extended climbing level.

If he wanted to go all in, he should have (with the help of 2-3 teammates) done 10 w/kg on the steep bottom part of the first climb (Glandon). Pogacar follows Vingegaard everywhere, this can also be exploited.
After Vingegaard and Pogacar both do 10 W/kg on the bottom of the first climb of a monster stage, no one knows what would have happened later. This is the definition of going all in and either of them could have completely collapsed later on.

(If Pogacar dos not follow, just abort immediately or go for a 150km solo attempt).

Visma is great at the satellite rider game, but they were overfocused on it the last tour. Half the use of a satellite rider is to be a threat so that Pogacar has to follow (which worked great in 2022 but is not necessary anymore because Pogacar will now follow anyway.)

 

[Panda Claws]

I'm a Remco fan, but I have to say I'm done with the excuses. The man is a limited climber at best.

His best GT performance left him more than 9mins behind Pogacar in TDF 24.

The amount of times we hit the proper climbs and we see him blowing up is unfair for him to endure. He is an outstanding TTer, one-day racer and brilliant at long range attacks on hilly terrain.

The man is NOT a climber. He is sacrificing results and potential victories in other races by chasing a dream of winning the Tour de France. He has ZERO chance of doing that.

Smoked in the UAE climbs, Meltdown in the Tour last year, Meltdown in the Vuelta in 23, didn't finish the Giro in 21 or 23, falls away in TDS stages once the road goes up.

Yet I hear all this tripe that he needs altitude camps, he needs to lose weight, he's not dialled in, he has no base, the AC was smashed. The man is killing himself trying to be someone he's not.

Giro 2023 is unfair to hold against him imo.

 

[Krzysztof_O]

Gaps are mostly due to overall aggression of the race.

Also, Pogacar has yet to win a Tour de France by a bigger gap than Nibali did.

Also, Pogacar has never won Milan-San Remo.
Lo Squalo > Pogi

 

[Tim Cahill]

A lot was talked about Pogacar's knee injury in the alps which explain his slight struggles, but I have no idea what was up with Vingegaard. He had his best day on Ventoux and then was weaker than expected in the Alps. Other riders like Lipowitz and Onley were quite consistent over the whole race so I don't think just external conditions were the reason. (I think he may have already somewhat given up and was already thinking about the Vuelta)

As for Evenepoel: One thing I noticed that he is often flying straight from (altitude) training but then does not get better / even worse after several races. It is not that he necessarily gets worse within a race (even in a 3 week GT). He instead seems to get worse in the 2nd and 3rd race back from training, especially if it is a stage race.

Other riders often get better in their 2nd race (e.g. Tiberi improving in UAE compared to Valencia). Of course this is just anectodal and not necessarily a fact.

There was a lot that puzzled me about Vingegaard in the summer, from the Dauphine to the Tour there were several off days despite a fresh run in and the comms coming out of the team pretending he was better than the year before, which he didn’t seem to be, despite coming back from a serious injury that year. Now they tell us he was at his best in the 2025 Vuelta despite getting dropped by Pidcock on a stage and losing to Almeida/Pellezzari on other mountain stages. He also looked completely average in Algarve, doesn’t quite add up.

 

[chickenlips]

I'm a Remco fan, but I have to say I'm done with the excuses. The man is a limited climber at best.

His best GT performance left him more than 9mins behind Pogacar in TDF 24.

The amount of times we hit the proper climbs and we see him blowing up is unfair for him to endure. He is an outstanding TTer, one-day racer and brilliant at long range attacks on hilly terrain.

The man is NOT a climber. He is sacrificing results and potential victories in other races by chasing a dream of winning the Tour de France. He has ZERO chance of doing that.

Smoked in the UAE climbs, Meltdown in the Tour last year, Meltdown in the Vuelta in 23, didn't finish the Giro in 21 or 23, falls away in TDS stages once the road goes up.

Yet I hear all this tripe that he needs altitude camps, he needs to lose weight, he's not dialled in, he has no base, the AC was smashed. The man is killing himself trying to be someone he's not.

The most sensible post in this thread. If only his fans would accept this, too. Great rider, but not that great.

 

[Netserk]

Now they tell us he was at his best in the 2025 Vuelta despite getting dropped by Pidcock on a stage and losing to Almeida/Pellezzari on other mountain stages. He also looked completely average in Algarve, doesn’t quite add up.

ive only seen that when talking about before he got ill, so mostly about how he performed on stage 9

 

[VayaVayaVaya]

His performance in 2024 was still better than what others did the year after. So he lost that capability completely or something is wrong

I just checked and, sure, he won Algarve in 2024, but he finished at s.t. second to Dani Martinez on both climbs, and didn’t beat anyone of note. So not sure he was better at this point in the year, and that was before his crash.

I'm a Remco fan, but I have to say I'm done with the excuses. The man is a limited climber at best.

His best GT performance left him more than 9mins behind Pogacar in TDF 24.

The amount of times we hit the proper climbs and we see him blowing up is unfair for him to endure. He is an outstanding TTer, one-day racer and brilliant at long range attacks on hilly terrain.

The man is NOT a climber. He is sacrificing results and potential victories in other races by chasing a dream of winning the Tour de France. He has ZERO chance of doing that.

Smoked in the UAE climbs, Meltdown in the Tour last year, Meltdown in the Vuelta in 23, didn't finish the Giro in 21 or 23, falls away in TDS stages once the road goes up.

Yet I hear all this tripe that he needs altitude camps, he needs to lose weight, he's not dialled in, he has no base, the AC was smashed. The man is killing himself trying to be someone he's not.

This is a bit extreme. He can win the right Tour with the right situation, but I agree Mano a Mano he is never beating Pogacar or Vingegaard without something unexpected happening. I think he would have made the leap if he was going to. Im not sure he could beat 2019 Vuelta Pogacar even if Pogi doesn’t get screwed in an echelon or something (and if he did, Remco no doubt would as well).

I agree it might be time to focus on everything but the Tour. He has a better chance at beating Pogi at Monuments IMO and could put together great palmares there.

Evenepoel won a 2022 Vuelta a Espana where he was able to come from altitude camp in peak shape and hit the hardest 2 mountains still being super fresh. Afterwards there hardly were any true obstacles. Neither @Libertine Seguros nor @hrotha with full Spanish patriotism considered that specific edition of the Vuelta a Espana a proper Grand Tour! (Correct my if I'm wrong)
It simply was the perfect race for someone like Remco that needs to come in peak shape and fresh as daisy to a race, but has big problems to maintain that shape over 3 weeks.

He also really isn't a climber. Aubisque already has been too much. Like I said Evenepoel has sunken more often on the big mountains than Evgeni Berzin who was actually famous for totally falling apart on serious ascends. Berzin overlived the Giro d'Italia mountaine in 1994 & 1995 though, while Remco cracked on Aubisque & Tourmalet early on.


Di Luca who definitely wasn't a true climber either at least drilled Finestre & Blockhaus.


Remco needs to sort this out, but it becomes less and less possible he actually can. He's a super strong classics rider that is able to limit his losses in the high mountains to archive a podium spot in an ideal race for himself it seems. Just like in 2023 at the Tour de France.


Already looks like Pellizzari needs to pull Red Bull's chestnuts out of the fire at the 2026 Giro d'Italia first, before they seek Grand Tour success at the Tour de France.


There will be Ayuso, Seixas, Evenepoel and Lippowitz. Plus Del Torro if he doesn't need to fully sacrifice himself for Pogacar which seems entirely possible.

Ayuso is just as fragile as Evenepoel. Seixas is super young going for his Grand Tour debut. But including Del Torro those are 3 guys that look stronger for a 3 week challenge AT THIS POINT that need to crack ALL before Red Bull can think about another Tour de France podium.


Huge enhancement is necessary!

Yes, he also was barely beating Roglic who was coming back from early season knee surgery, fresh off fractured vertebrae in the Tour, and limited training. It really came together for him this year. The next year with better competition, he was destroyed.