Wout Van Aert’s Giro Dreams Are in Jeopardy
Watching Wout van Aert in a bloody and bruised pile at Dwars door Vlaanderen broke the hearts of cycling fans worldwide. And there was likely no bigger heartbreak than Van Aert’s own.
The first thing most cycling fans thought as we watched Van Aert heaped over on the roadside holding his arm, his bright yellow Visma-Lease a Bike jersey torn to shreds, was that his spring season—which he had been so vocally and publicly targeting—was done.
The crash, which happened with 67 kilometers left in last week’s Belgian semi-classic, also collected stars Biniam Girmay (Intermaché-Wanty), Jasper Stuyven, and Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek), though it seems Van Aert suffered the most brutal of injuries (Stuyven also broke a collarbone and underwent surgery in the same hospital as Van Aert). Those injuries included a broken sternum, several broken ribs, and a broken collarbone.
The day after the crash, his team tweeted that Van Aert underwent successful surgery. The tweet also said what everyone feared: Wout van Aert’s spring season was finished.
“This sucks,” said van Aert’s teammate Tiesj Benoot, whose wheel Van Aert was on at the moment of the Dwars door Vlaanderen crash. “Wout was in the form of his life.”
Going back to late last year, Van Aert had been saying that some of his biggest goals were to win Paris-Roubaix and his home race, the Tour of Flanders. He’ll also miss the Amstel Gold Race. But his main goal for the 2024 season was to ride his first Giro d’Italia, his debut in the Grand Tour known for its bright maglia rosa.
As Visma-Lease a Bike is heading into the Giro without a clear GC contender, over the winter it was rumored that this might finally be Van Aert’s chance to try and ride for his first Grand Tour victory, something his fans have been waiting for years, and something his detractors have said he’s hardly capable of.
However, in the late Winter, Van Aert quickly dismissed the idea of chasing the pink jersey, noting, quite sadly, given his recent injuries, that he didn’t want to lose weight to contend for GC. According to the Belgian, changing his body composition to better suit the Giro’s high and brutal mountain climbs would have jeopardized his performance in the Spring Classics.
The Road to Recovery
The Giro kicks off on May 4, five weeks and two days after Van Aert’s surgery last week. According to Louis Almekinders, MD, a professor of orthopedic surgery at Duke University and founding partner at the North Carolina Orthopedic Clinic, that window is likely far too small for Van Aert to return on the bike in May.
Almekinders is speculating on the same limited information as the rest of the world. Still, he pointed specifically toward Van Aert’s ribs as the most limiting factor in his recovery. “The rib fractures are the biggest problem in a way,” he said, citing that, unlike a collarbone fracture, broken ribs often can’t be stabilized with plates, allowing the bones to move around in the body as they heal. Additionally, as the lungs press against the ribs, exercise can compound the level of pain.
When asked if there was any chance—knowing what we know now—Wout van Aert could start the Giro on May 4, Almekinders had serious doubts. “I don’t think so,” he said. “I mean, that would be stunning—unless he’s Superman, which he kind of is.”
Looking past the Giro entirely, Van Aert’s Olympic hopes may be affected as well, if for no other reason than the training setback the 29-year-old will experience during the recovery period. “He’s probably going to be cutting his chronic training load in half right now,” said Joe Stone, MD, a clinical professor of orthopedic surgery at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and avid cyclist.
“He’s not going to be starting at his winter miles (whenever he gets back on the bike). He’s going to be below that. It would be very surprising if it did not affect his Olympic prep,” Stone added. “Every single day, he is losing chronic training load numbers that will affect his top end. He’ll be at least half by the time he starts his training again. But if there’s one thing I learned, it’s don’t discount the likes of the current generation. Herculean efforts are possible with these guys.”
Are His Giro Dreams Deferred?
In the short term, this means that Visma-Lease a Bike is likely going to throw all of its might behind the young Cian Uijtdebroeks, who will only be starting the second Grand Tour of his career when the Giro kicks off early next month, for both the pink jersey and as many stage wins as possible. The 21-year-old Belgian showed great form in last year’s Vuelta, where he finished eighth overall with his former BORA-hansgrohe team.
With Remco Evenepoel and Primož Roglič focusing on the Tour and 2022 Giro Champion Jai Hindley training to work in support of Roglič in the Grand Boucle, the Giro podium is more wide open than it has been in years.
It also means that should Van Aert’s body not be healed by early May, Visma could consider designating him once again as a super domestique and a weapon to help Jonas Vingegaard to a third-straight Tour de France victory. However, such a move would take some convincing of Van Aert, who reportedly wants to spend the summer focusing on the Paris Olympics.
Crashes and injuries are part of cycling. Considering this, team directors like Visma’s Grisha Niermann are experts at shuffling their proverbial decks and sitting on backup plans and backup plans. However, according to Niermann, it’s still far too early to think about the rest of Van Aert’s 2024 season.
“It’s way too early to think about plan B for now,” Niermann said shortly after he spent time at van Aert’s hospital bedside. At the moment, we’re just thinking about when he can go home to his family. When he gets back on the bike, then we can start talking about his next goals.”
Inspiring Comebacks
Though every crash and subsequent injury comes with its own challenges, Van Aert needs only to look around at his contemporaries for a few examples of riders coming back from major injuries to enjoy major successes.
Fabio Jakobsen has won six Grand Tour stages and major races like Scheldeprijs, Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne, and Nokere Koerse after suffering injuries sustained in a crash that left him in a two-day-long coma.
Remco Evenepoel broke his pelvis after falling from a bridge in 2020’s Il Lombardia. He recovered well enough to wear the pink jersey in the 2023 Giro, win that year’s Vuelta, and rack up a series of victories, including twice at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, a pair of World Championships (’22 on the road and ’23 in the time trial).
And a few weeks ago, Egan Bernal took his first major podium after a horrific training accident in 2022.
Now comes the exciting part: where we get to watch one of this generation’s great talents return to form, challenge the races that have thus far eluded him, and see him win again. Speedy recovery Wout.
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