'It was a joke' - Van der Poel helps Rickaert to Tour de France podium
Everyone thought Van der Poel was looking for green jersey points, instead he was trying to get his friend on the podium. And he promised the points classification his not a priority.
With two stage wins, a second place, yellow and green jerseys and a breakaway on stage six, no one could accuse Alpecin Deceuninck of failing to entertain. On Sunday’s stage into Châteauroux, though, they were the stars of the show.
Almost as soon as the flag dropped for the start of the 174km stage, the team were on the attack, sending Mathieu van der Poel and Jonas Rickaert up the road. The peloton clearly thought they weren’t serious, they’d surely sit up and roll back to the bunch after the early intermediate sprint. Wouldn’t they?
Van der Poel duly took the maximum points after 24.2km, but the two leaders were nowhere to be seen, instead they were 5.30 up the road and they stayed there. The plan was, according to Van der Poel at least, not the points, but to help his team mate realise a childhood dream.
“I discussed with Jonas that we wanted to go for it today,” Van der Poel said afterwards. “His dream is to be on the Tour de France podium, so I was happy to help him to get combativity and I hoped to give it to him.” And he did just that, the Belgian rouleur lived his dream and will wear the red race number dossard on Mondays 10th stage.
To do that, though, the pair would need to keep riding, and riding. Indeed, when Rickaert finally pulled off the front, exhausted, his skinsuit stained with sweat, he’d been off the front for 168km.
“Actually I made a joke of it, to go with two from the start, but it seems he was serious so we just continued and I was slowly dying but we tried,” said Rickaert of his Dutch team mate.
By the time the sprinter’s teams took their deficit seriously it was panic stations and it could be said they were saved by the crosswinds, repeated attempts to split the race lifting the pace inexorably. When Rickaert could pull no more the gap was little more than 30 seconds.
But it wasn’t just any old rider at the front, it was Mathieu van der Poel, and he rarely throws in the towel. Instead he literally gritted his teeth, set his jaw and cracked on. The chase came and went, some of the Alpecin riders interfered, some teams put in consistent efforts, others tried one off moves, and for a while it seemed Van der Poel would make it.
But no, the rampant Dutchman was caught inside the final kilometre, eventually rolling over the line 68th, Tim Merlier (Soudal-Quickstep) winning the bunch sprint.
“In the end we came really close but I think we were both just on the limit,” van der Poel said. “It was a very hard day and the roads were not really helping with two riders in front, and of course with the wind we knew the GC teams would come back at certain moments. But I think we put on a good show today.
“I’m not going for the green jersey it was really for the breakaway and we knew that it was also the possibility of the echelon maybe bridging to us, but we suffered but also enjoyed today.”
And Rickaert? “I think I’ll go home tomorrow, my Tour is done,” he joked. “We didn’t speak, in the end I said I’m exhausted, but he said we need each other. In the end I was just empty. I think every sports director who passed me said thumbs up so it seems like we did a good effort.”
They certainly did.
