No sooner had the UCI Road World Championships men’s road race finished than the questions about Belgium’s inability to win a medal quickly began.
“Why did Julian Vermote work so hard so early?” asked Freddy Maertens when quizzed by Het Laatste Nieuws.
“If you go to the final with Sagan, you know he's almost unbeatable. Maybe they needed to make attacks to prevent that,” Eddy Merckx suggested.
The pressure was on Greg Van Avermaet, Philippe Gilbert and the rest of the nine-rider elite men’s team to deliver for Belgium after the juniors, under-23 and women had all failed to land a medal.
Van Avermaet and Gilbert are two of the sport’s best Classics riders, but neither are Sagan-class sprinters. That weakness was exposed in Bergen. After failing to go with Julian Alaphilippe on the final assault of Salmon Hill, and failing to get away in the finale, Van Avermaet and Gilbert finished sixth and 17th respectively.
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The Belgian team had been active and vigilant throughout the race, with Tim Wellens in the best break of the finale with two laps to go. However, a crash just before the final climb of Salmon Hill took out Tiesj Benoot, Jens Keukeleire and Jasper Stuyven, leaving Van Avermaet and Gilbert alone to try to find a solution.
Gilbert tried to go with Alaphilippe when his Quick-Step Floors teammate launched his powerful acceleration on Salmon Hill, but he lacked the punch to go with him and he doubts that the move would stay away to the finish played on his mind.
“I knew that Julian would do something, that’s why I was on his wheel,” Gilbert pragmatically explained to the French-speaking media, as an apparent defence against any criticism.
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