‘All or nothing’ - Arnaud De Lie takes an emotional Renewi Tour victory

After the tears came exultation for Arnaud De Lie. The Lotto rider was in tears almost as soon as he raised his arms to celebrate his stunning stage win at the Renewi Tour on Sunday, he was sobbing when Mathieu van der Poel gave him a congratulatory hug and there’s a good chance some of those watching on TV were wiping tears away when his father wrapped his arms around him.

But by the time his team mates arrived it was all laughs. He had wiped away not only the tears, but the hurt of a year to forget. A season of doubt and chasing victories but never quite taking them. The tears gone, there was still disbelief in De Lie’s post-race interview.

"I played all or nothing. I'm speechless,” he said. "I really played poker. It was all or nothing and it worked out."

De Lie is not quite a pure sprinter, he needs a hard day to be able to best the likes of Tim Merlier (Soudal-Quickstep) or Olav Kooij (Visma | Lease a Bike) but that makes him vulnerable to the likes of Van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) and before Sunday he’d not won since Etoile de Besseges in early February. The classics, where he should thrive were a non-event, his best result 14th place at Le Samyn, and at WorldTour level 86th at Omloop Nieuwsblad was barely something to boast about for a man of his class.

After taking April off there were glimmers of hope with third place at the Brussels Cycling Classics and he built through the Tour de France, taking five top 10 placings. Though he still hadn’t crossed the line first, he began Sunday’s final stage of the Renewi Tour leading Van der Poel by one second overall, but it seemed even that might be lost when the Dutchman overhauled that advantage at the Green Kilometre sprint. 

De Lie is nothing if not tenacious though.

"It was a really tough day, and Mathieu was taking seconds at the bonus points. That's when I said, 'Screw it.’" De Lie said. "It definitely wasn't my best day on the bike either, but sometimes it's better to stay calm and just try something with your legs today.”

Despite having looked completely exhausted and finding himself out of position, De Lie was still in the reduced bunch racing to the conclusion in Leuven. He didn’t panic when Dries De Bondt (Decathlon-AG2R La Mondiale) attacked late on, all he needed to do was bag more bonus seconds than Van der Poel. In the final he found Pavel Bittner’s (Picnic-PostNL) wheel and made the win seem almost easy.

"I might have lost my leader's jersey, but I had to wait for a sprint. Besides, I saw that it was still a large group. Pavel Bittner has only ridden good sprints here, he was my lucky charm. I followed him, and the timing was perfect.

"I'm just overjoyed right now. Winning a stage was my first goal, but also winning the general classification? That's unbelievable. Against Van der Poel, of all people, who's not just anyone. With a WorldTour general classification to boot. That's a dream."

"When you always finish second, you never get that icing on the cake. Well, today it wasn't just one, but two or three cherries on the cake."