Remco Evenepoel could make 2024 Tour de France a three-way showdown with Vingegaard and Pogacar

Already a world champion and winner of the Vuelta a Espana, former footballer Remco Evenepoel is set to race his first Tour de France this year

Remco Evenepoel winning the Belgian national title in June (Belga/AFP via Getty)

Remco Evenepoel is only 23, but his long list of nicknames is already getting out of hand.

Some are better than others. The Machine is a little soulless for such an aggressive rider. El Fenomeno Evenepoel doesn’t quite rhyme, and it isn’t very Belgian. Aero Bullet is the brainchild of his teammate Yves Lampaert, inadvertently comparing one of the best cyclists in the world with one of the worst aircraft ever constructed. The Red Flash only works when he is wearing the Vuelta a Espana’s red jersey, while Geraint Thomas’s affectionate description – The Little Bastard – might not catch on.

Perhaps most telling is The Little Cannibal, a reference to the great Eddy Merckx. Comparisons with Merckx are inevitable for every young Belgian cyclist, but with Evenepoel it’s more than just hyperbole. “Jesus distributes talent equally,” his teammate Tim Declercq said recently, “but not with Remco.” Belgium expects him to win the Tour de France, multiple times.

That pressure partly explains why he has not yet ridden the Tour, until now. Evenepoel could have gone along last July to contest a few stages, but he lacked form after leaving the Giro d’Italia with Covid and did not want to give anything less than everything.

“You guys would be sad about that,” he told the media. “If I drop on the first mountain stage, it would be like a big bomb explosion in Belgium. With the goals and the way of racing I have, it’s almost impossible to go to the Tour de France without expectations.”

Evenepoel is immensely popular in his homeland (Belga/AFP via Getty)

Evenepoel wore the Giro leader’s pink jersey before catching Covid (Reuters)

Now Evenepoel has announced he will race the Tour de France in 2024. The race has been dominated over the past four years by Tadej Pogacar along with Jonas Vingegaard, whose ice withstood Pogacar’s fire last summer. Their duopoly is no bad thing – their rivalry has been one of the most absorbing for many years – but let’s allow ourselves to be greedy for a moment: a three-horse race would be something very rare, and very special to watch.

It would create a fascinating clash of styles. History shows us there are many different ways to win a Tour. Master climbers blow the rest away in the mountains, like Fausto Coppi, who surged up Alpe d’Huez in 1952 and won by 28 minutes. Likewise, Vingegaard comes alive when the road tilts into the clouds. Occasionally a rider bullies from start to finish, like Bernard Hinault, who crushed opponents en route to the Champs-Elysees in 1981. Likewise, Pogacar dominated the 2021 Tour in similar fashion, wearing the yellow jersey from stage eight to Paris and winning three stages to stamp his authority on the race.

Then there are the time-trial specialists who mark their rivals on the climbs and hurt them on the clock, like the giant Miguel Indurain, who obliterated the peloton that way in 1992 and again in 1994. This is one of Evenepoel’s greatest weapons, as a world junior and European time-trial champion who transfers that talent to the race. “When I’m alone in the break, it’s a bit like a time trial,” he told The Times. “My strategy in a time trial is just to push hard on the flat parts just under a limit, and then when I have to I go just above the limit, and then I always focus on my position, on the cadence, on the power.”

Evenepoel celebrates winning the 2022 Vuelta a Espana (AP)

There are almost 60km of individual time trial in this year’s Tour de France route, about as much as Evenepoel could reasonably hope for. That includes a 35km time-trial finale in Nice, instead of the traditional parade to the Champs-Elysees, which was not deemed possible only a few days before the Paris 2024 Olympics begin. Vingegaard and Pogacar will need to kill off Evenepoel’s challenge before that stage 21 time-trial, or they will be in danger.

His strong legs developed partly through genetics – Evenepoel’s father Patrick was a professional cyclist – and partly by circumstance. Remco was a talented footballer and moved to the Netherlands aged 11 to join PSV Eindhoven’s prestigious academy. He would cycle 10km to training each morning, and would regularly stun coaches with his fitness levels. He was picked up and later rejected by Anderlecht’s youth system, and a sense of injustice lit a fire.

His career progress has been rapid and reads like a script for how to build a cycling icon: become junior world champion; win some minor races, then some major races too; become a European champion, then recover from a terrible crash to become world champion; win one of the five Monuments, Liege-Bastogne-Liege, and defend your crown; win one of the three grand tours, La Vuelta, and lead the Giro too. And once you’ve done all that, there’s really only one place left to go.

Evenepoel crosses the line to defend his Liege-Bastogne-Liege crown (AP)

There are three years remaining on Evenepoel’s contract with Belgian team Soudal-Quickstep, but rumours abound last summer of a move to either Ineos Grenadiers or Israel Premier-Tech, both of whom have bigger budgets that could boost his salary from around €2m (£1.7m) to closer to that of Pogacar – who, on €7m per year, is the richest man in the peloton.

Evenepoel moved to quash those reports. “I have a contract until the end of 2026 and I’m going to respect it,” he told the Lanterne Rouge podcast. “A contract is a contract. You can’t just walk away and say ‘I wish you all the best and goodbye’. You can’t do that. The world of cycling is not the world of soccer.”

So he appears set to stay at Soudal-Quickstep for the medium term. Evenepoel’s personality has bloomed in the peloton, and it was a sign of his maturity when he took the time to message Thomas directly at the Giro, to give his rival news of his positive Covid test before the media confronted him. Now, after five glorious years growing as a professional, Evenepoel is ripe to ride the Tour de France. All he needs is a good nickname.