Some way short of his scintillating best, Julian Alaphilippe has resorted to extreme measures in his bid to find form for the Tour of Flanders, adding two hours onto Dwars door Vlaanderen.
The Frenchman placed 29th on Wednesday, spending just over four hours in the saddle in what was a breathless edition of the mid-week Classic, which he himself helped animate. However, that wasn't considered enough, and he went on to ride his bike for an extra two hours around the Flemish Ardennes.
"I'm off to train," Alaphilippe said at the finish. "I've still got two hours to do."
Soudal-QuickStep team boss Patrick Lefevere confirmed Alaphilippe was setting off for an extra ride from Waregem, describing the Frenchman as "old-school" and "superstitious". Alaphilippe has been known to add training onto race days, reportedly riding 40km ahead of the Primus Classic in 2021, the week before he won his second straight World Championship.
"There is progress with a view to Sunday," Lefevere said, seemingly content with Alaphilippe's shape despite another bruising day for his team.
Alaphilippe won the Ardèche Classic in late February but hasn't stood out in the races since, placing 11th at Milan-San Remo before stomach problems held him back at last week's first Flanders tune-up: E3 Saxo Classic. In the absence of Kasper Asgreen and Yves Lampaert, he led the team at Dwars door Vlaanderen, in search of hope for himself and the team ahead of the Ronde on Sunday.
In the end, they came away empty handed once again, though with some caveats. Alaphilippe attempted to open the race on berg Ten Houte with just over 70km to go but found his gears jammed and had to drift back, while the team's sprinter Tim Merlier crashing soon after.
Alaphilippe was active during a fluid part of the race but couldn't follow as Tiesj Benoot (Jumbo-Visma) opened the race up on the Knokteberg, and he spent the rest of the day pulling a chasing bunch in aid of Davide Ballerini, who ended up seventh.
"It was very nervous and someone hit my derailleur. I did the whole race with gears that were acting up, but it's difficult to find a good moment to change bikes," Alaphilippe said.
"I didn't make any errors in terms of positioning but when Benoot made his attack on the climbs I didn't have the legs to follow. Still, it worked out ok anyway. I'm glad I could contribute something.
"No regrets. The best case was that it would come back for a sprint with Davide but he indicated to me that he didn't have incredible legs, and in that group there were lots of strong sprinters, so no regrets."
Alaphilippe said it did him good to "make some hard efforts" and seemed excited rather than fazed by the prospect of a 273km Tour of Flanders on Sunday.
"It's going to be much longer and certainly much harder," he said as he set off to take his tally for the day to six hours.
Will it be enough to save Soudal-QuickStep's spring?
