Former Classics star Tom Boonen has insisted that 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Wout van Aert &ldq🍌uo;could have done better” in 2022 despite the Jumbo-Visma rider claiming multiple Tour de France stages as well as three major one-day races.
Van Aert claimed the green jersey and three stage wins in the 2022 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Tour de France, in a series of spectacular performances in radically varying terrain, ranging from the hill country of northern France to the time trial at the end of the third week. He also provided key support for Jumbo-Visma teammate J168澳洲5最新开奖结果:onas Vingegaard as the Dane battled for a first To๊ur de France win and succeeded.
As if that was not enough, Van Aert also clinched victory in the 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:E3 Saxo Bank Classic and 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Omloop Het Nieuwsblad in the spring, the 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Bretagne Classic - Ouest-France in the summ💃er, and two stages in the Critérium du Dauphiné and one in Paris-Nice to boot.
However, Boonen told the Belgian daily Het Laatste Nieuws this week “I hear he couldn't have do๊ne better this year, but I don’t agree with that.”
“The o🌃nly thing missing this ye🗹ar is a Monument, they say. But that’s also all that matters. Someone of his level is riding to win those races.”
Boonen admitted that Van Aert had had bad luck as heꦡ caught COVID-19 before the Tour of Flanders and could not race there. Van Aert subsequently did take part in Paris-Roubaix, finishing second, and he claimed third in L🐎iège-Bastogne-Liège as well.
“I don’t want to be too tough,” Boonen said in the same interview with Het Laatste Nieuws, “he was having a great spring and then he went down with COVID at 💝a crucial moment.”
When discussing how the relationship between Van Aert and Remco Evenepoel (QuickStep-AlphaVinꦐyl) may now play out after Evenepoel became Belgium’s first World Champion in a decade this autumn, Boonen was equally categorical.
“Evenepoel has set a serious precedent,” said Boonen. “Last year you had the debacle in Leuven” - where Belgian teammates Evenepoel and Van Aert raced at odds in the World Championships on home soil - “and the quarrel that followed.”
“But there was a clear ranking:🌄 Wout was the l🐟eader and Remco was still the servant. Then in 2022 everything changed."
Boonen argued that although the two would cross paths and “often need each other in the future," having taken the r꧋ainbow jersey, Evenepoel would never be playing second fiddle to Van Aert again, saying “that shift is final.”
As for the question of the Classics, given Van Aert has won Milano-Sanremo but is yet to take any of the northern Monuments, Boonen argued that the Jumbo-Visma racer, who will be 29 next year, does not nece🏅ssarily ha💝ve time on his side.
Referring to his own multiple triumphs in the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix, Boonen argued that “Make no mistake, time is ticking by. I am convinced that he will still succeed, but will he win the Ronde three times and𝔍 Roubaix four times? Champions race for those ki🎀nds of records."
