Hungry like the wolf – Remco Evenepoel and the hunt for an ever-expanding legacy

It’s two and a half hours into a five-hour training ride and Remco Evenepoel is out of the saddle and spinning his legs up one of the fierce ascents that pepper the landscape on the outskirts of Calpe, Spain.

After countless training rides in this neck of the woods, Soudal-Quickstep sports director Klaas Lodewyck has become used to the view – both of the scenery along the picturesque Spanish coastline and of his rider as he follows in the team car for yet another training expedition.

The former Belgian pro, who cut his cloth as a rider at BMC Racing before hanging up his wheels and joining Soudal-Quickstep at the same time as Evenepoel in 2019, has spent well over a hundred days alongside the double Olympic champion this season, following the athlete from training camps in the winter through the Tour de France and the most recent success in Paris. Their bond is as strong as it is long.

“I don’t count the days. If I did, my wife would freak out,” Lodewyck says from the driver’s seat of the team car as Evenepoel crests the climb and begins a descent that will take him towards another test.

This is probably the last time that the Lodewyck and Evenepoel tandem will work in Spain this year. Now, as the rider puts the finishing touches to his form ahead of the Zurich Worlds Championships, it’s almost time to reflect on a season of incredible highs and development.

Introspection and self-analysis can wait just a little longer, however. There are still two more rainbow jerseys up for grabs this month and if there’s a challenge, Evenepoel and his trusted DS will not stop until they’ve achieved it.

“It’s not easy and he was sick a few days after the Olympics but it was good that he did the Tour of Britain earlier this month,” Lodewyck says. “The stages weren’t too long, and we had three intense days to get the body going again. We know that he can focus on a race but you also need to be lucky with how you wake up on a day at Worlds but for sure he’s focused once more. He also has no pressure, so that’s also a benefit.”

Pressure, however, follows Evenepoel wherever he goes. Last winter, as the then 23–year–old and his entourage discussed and dissected battle plans for the coming season the aim was to focus on several key objectives. The Spring Classics, a debut Tour de France, the Olympics and then the Worlds would be the basis of his campaign. The goals were lofty, of course, but for a rider of Evenepoel’s ability, this was always going to be a grander season than most.

“The aim was to have the best possible preparation towards the Worlds but with also having a good build-up towards the Ardennes and then the Tour but for us it was about having that good prep and then seeing the results from the Tour de France and seeing if that build-up worked for the future,” Lodewyck says when casting his mind back almost twelve months ago.

“With the Olympics, we still wanted to find a way for Remco to be a bit fresh after the Tour de France but of course, we didn’t really know how that would all work, but we didn't want to do too much before the Tour.”

Last winter, of course, Evenepoel had just come off a bruising Vuelta a España in which he’d dazzled with multiple stage wins but fluffed his lines in the battle for GC after a disastrous day on the Tourmalet cost him close to 27 minutes. Despite that humbling, the rider was determined to rebound for the Tour this July, and he and Lodewyck comprised a plan built on complete dedication and commitment. Evenepoel moved away from his home in Belgium and into his new abode in Spain to seek warmer climates, and the combination of isolation and training allowed him to reach new levels. As Lodewyck says: “Remco could basically walk to the team training camp now.”

A crash in April at the Tour of Basque Country rocked the Tour preparations and meant that Evenepoel missed valuable training time, along with his beloved Ardennes Classics, but even after a patchy Dauphiné, the 24-year-old arrived at the Tour in the best condition ever witnessed.

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He raced impeccably throughout July, dovetailing his prowess against the clock with a new-found ability to race with fully developed tactical nous in the mountains. Not once did the Belgian expose his limitations against Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard when the road pointed upwards, with the Soudal leader relying upon key support from teammate Mikel Landa and his own ability to ignore temptation and instead ride within himself. It was the most complete Grand Tour performance we’d ever witnessed from Evenepoel, even when considering his winning ride at the Vuelta back in 2022.

“I think he finished within our expectations. Some days he did better, especially with the gravel stage. We were very confident, but we talked a lot about the preparation and we all knew that there were two guys still above him, especially on GC with Tadej and Jonas,” Lodewyck says.

“And we knew that it was better for us to not go with them when they were in a full battle and to not be involved. We knew that Roglič was a candidate for the podium, and I won't say that we focused on him but there were a few guys that we focused on for the podium spots. We knew it was possible to finish in the third spot. A lot of people said that he raced maturely, and he did, but we also knew what to expect from the other GC guys.”

If the Tour cemented Evenepoel as a candidate for future Tour de France success, then the Olympics delivered a different variety of magnificence and celebrity. The Tour probably mattered more to cycling diehards, but at home in Belgium, his victories against the clock and in the road race, especially given the dramatic circumstances of the late puncture in the latter event, warmed hearts towards Evenepoel in a way perhaps not seen before. The photo of the rider celebrating under the Eiffel Tower, bike aloft and in the Belgian kit, was both iconic and representative of Evenpoel’s growing popularity and legacy.

“What he did in the Olympics was great,” says Marc Sergeant, who once ran the show at Soudal-Quickstep’s fierce domestic rivals, Lotto.

“If you look at the conditions, how he dealt with the flat tyre in the road race and the iconic photo of him under the Eiffel Tower with his bike in the air, it is incredible. What that did was give him a boost in Belgium but also all over the world and he did it twice in a week. What he did was exceptional.”

According to Sergeant, Evenepoel’s opinion ratings also increased back home after his Paris efforts.

“People were a bit yes and no with him before. He had that character, but he’s made progress with winning the hearts of cycling fans who were maybe not his greatest supporters by doing all those things in Paris and at the Tour,” Sergeant says. “He’s 24, he started late because of football and that went against him at the start a little bit. He’s more accepted now and he’s more mature. Before that, there was an expectation around him and the moment there was the slightest thing wrong, they said it was because he was a football player. That’s changed though with his behaviour and because of what he’s done on the bike.

“He’s one of the best riders in the world, that’s for sure, but the question was whether he would be able to reach that goal of a top-five in the Tour de France. He made the podium and now more people in Belgium have grown and warmed to him. Internationally, if you saw the Tour of Britain, fans were drawn to him and you saw him willing to have photos and autographs, that showed the interest from other countries.”

Whatever happens in Zurich over the coming fortnight, few would argue with Evenepoel's progress this season. His third place at the Tour, his monumental achievement at the Olympics and his escalating maturity on and off the bike will surely stand him in good stead next season. His palmarès is already an unquestionable success, with world titles at junior and senior level, a Grand Tour, two Olympic golds, two Liège-Bastogne-Liège victories and a podium at the Tour.

If it wasn’t for the astonishing achievements of Pogačar, we would probably consider Evenpeoel the greatest rider of his generation. Yet, while most riders would already have their feet up and on the beach at this point in the year, Evenepoel is back at it, and training as though the season was just about to start.

And who knows, perhaps another double could be on the cards with Evenpeoel racing both the time trial and the road race over the next fortnight.

“Everything is possible when you’re at the start line, but he should start with the TT first, and then see how that goes,” says Lodewyck.

“It’s not an obsession but the road race suits him. There is Tadej so it all depends on how the competitors are going.”

As for 2025, it’s unclear what Evenepoel’s objectives will be. The most likely scenario involves another steady build-up before targeting the Ardennes and then the Tour de France in July.

“I don’t think that you have to change much,” Lodewyck says matter of factly.

“We should remain focused on the main goals but if we can improve his performance. We should stick with the same plan and see what we can gain. I’d just start again with a good recovery this winter. I think he can match the Tour result from last year and each winter he’s having better numbers so he can still make another step on top of that.”

Quite where that step will land him is unclear. There’s talk of Vingegaard racing the Giro d’Italia before the Tour, but Roglič and Pogačar will head to the Tour at full tilt, while there will undoubtedly be plenty of twists and turns along the way.

One of them may even surround Evenepoels’ immediate future with speculation rife over a possible change in teams. This soap opera has been part of the media landscape for several years now, and while the rider himself has attempted to put out fires and quell the rumours they’ve still persisted with Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe reportedly ready to offer the rider a long-term deal that would make him the second best-paid rider in the world behind Pogačar.

For Sergeant, the most likely scenario would be for Evenepoel to stay at Soudal-Quickstep, the team that signed and developed the rider and then completely remodelled themselves from a Classics outfit into Grand Tour contenders under the orders of team boss Patrick Lefevere.

“He’s obliged to stay because they’ve made a lot of efforts for him,” Sergeant says.

“Patrick Lefevere had a hard time in the Spring Classics because they had no one to compete with the best in races like Flanders and Roubaix. That was hard because for twenty years they were dominating and that was a hard situation for Patrick to swallow, but it was because he was giving part of the team to Remco.

“If you look at the future maybe his future is to stay, and the team invest in more riders for him. If he leaves the team now I think it would be strange but money is important, and money talks. He has the hearts of most of the Belgian people, and I don’t think it would be smart to sell him.”

Sentiment aside, for Lodewyck it’s a case of head down and planning for the future. At Soudal-Quickstep.

“It’s not really a distraction because it’s been going on for two and a half, almost three years and these rumours will never stop because there are only a handful of riders like Remco and every team wants them,” Lodewyck says. “I try not to think about it because  we can only focus on what we can do.”

And while contracts and money are important factors within sport, so too are loyalty, faith and bonds. Lodewyck and Evenepoel have had the better part of six years to develop theirs, and there is a clear understanding between the athlete and DS that simply can’t be guaranteed or replicated anywhere else.

“You know it can be a look in the morning that he gives you, and immediately you know how he feels and if he’s good or not. When you go to races like the Tour you need that good bond, and there’s no other way of doing it,” the sports director says.

“It started when I joined the team, they said that I would follow Remco and we had a good connection right away. The more we’re together the better the bond, and you want the rider to give 200 percent because I see Remco more than my own kids, so I think he understands that.”

And so far, what Evenepoel has built, with Lodewyck and Soudal-Quickstep by his side, has been pretty special. They have the hunger, they have the drive and, most exciting of all, they’re still only in the early days of building a legacy.

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