Wout van Aert will soon start his spring in De Omloop, time for the organizing newspaper to ask the rider some questions, they thought at Het Nieuwsblad. And a lot of interesting things emerged there.
Van Aert was allowed to ask the questions himself, and started by asking which race he would like to ride again. He didn’t have to think about that for long. “The 2020 Tour of Flanders. I would like to do that sprint again. Mainly because I think I could have won. It was super close,” Van Aert obviously remembers as if it were yesterday.
“For a long time I was disappointed that I handled it wrong. I should have started earlier and made it a longer sprint. Then I would have had more chances. Now the distance we started was too short to pass someone like Mathieu anyway,” he says with a mea culpa.
Same story in Roubaix
Another big disappointment in the cobblestone classics followed last year in Roubaix. Van Aert attacked but suddenly noticed that he was on an idler. What if he hadn’t had that? “… I would have at least sprinted for the win,” Van Aert is convinced.
“I thought about that often last season. That was a real disappointment. Fortunately, the new season has arrived. It’s nice to look forward to new opportunities. That’s what I work for.”
Adoration for Pogacar
On to its competitors then. Which rider would Van Aert have liked to swap with? Once again he doesn’t have to think long. “… Pogacar, for his versatility, who can climb even more than myself and can still sprint extremely fast despite his weight.”
He also likes him in terms of personality. “I don’t know him personally. You sometimes laugh about it and talk to it during the race, but we don’t really have a personal connection. If you go by his appearance, everything is fun with him and that is a nice way to look at life.”
The ideal sport for Georges and Jerome
And of course sons Georges and Jerome could not be missed. Which sport does Van Aert like to see them practice in the future? “Basketball”, it sounds clear again. “Because I am a fan and my wife has always played basketball. I think it is a very nice sport that is emerging somewhat in Belgium, especially because of the Cats.”
De Kempenaar also sees another big advantage. “And it is safe or certainly safer. They are also allowed to cycle, it is far too beautiful a sport to advise them against it, but I also know the dangers. Ultimately it has to come from them. I’m not actually going to advise them anything at all. They just have to do what they want.”
