Belgian Wout Van Aert, third in Paris-Roubaix on Sunday, said he was “proud of his race” despite the bad luck that hit him when he suffered a puncture just after going on the attack in one of the last cobbled sectors of the day.
“I’m proud of the level I’ve shown in the last races”, he said at a press conference, he who remains on relative failures during the first two “Monuments” of the season, on Milan-Sanremo ( 2nd) and in the Tour of Flanders (4th). “We can be proud of our race,” he added.
“It could have been a different ending”
“I’m happy to be on the podium, at least, but it could have been a different final,” he admitted. The leader of the Jumbo-Visma had taken the lead about a hundred kilometers from the finish, accelerating in the Haveluy sector, just before the Trouée d’Arenberg.
The Belgian was then at the head of a small group in which his teammate Christophe Laporte appeared and in which, conversely, his rival Mathieu van der Poel was isolated, without any teammate from Alpecin.
But Laporte punctured a few kilometers later, out of Arenberg, while Van der Poel recovered two teammates, including Jasper Philipsen, who finally beat Van Aert in the sprint for second place.
“It’s a classic Roubaix scenario, you have the impression of having played well then, two minutes later, everything is turned upside down”, noted, disillusioned, Wout Van Aert. Very strong, he and Van der Poel then broke away and tackled the last large cobbled section of the race alone, the Carrefour de l’Arbre.
“I tried to stay calm (…) When I decided to attack, I punctured…”, he regretted. “The whole last kilometer of the sector, I had a punctured wheel”, he explained, while Mathieu van der Poel countered him in the last hectometres of the sector, leaving with a few lengths in advance.
Was he stronger than the Dutch on Sunday? “I don’t like to speculate, replied Van Aert, he pushed me to my limits with his attacks (…) but when I attacked, I felt really strong and I think I had the legs to do it. better.”
The Belgian maintains a thwarted relationship with “the Hell of the north”, like his repeated falls in 2021 and the Covid-19 which had caught up with him a week before the 2022 edition.