Outside the Visma-Lease a Bike bus in Arnuero on Wednesday afternoon, directeur sportif Grischa Niermann was putting words on the latest setback in Wout van Aert's star-crossed 2024 season. "'The Tour waits for no one' is the saying, but apparently neither does the Vuelta," Niermann said resignedly.
And neither, of course, does the UCI Road World Championships. Van Aert crashed out of the Vuelta a España on the descent of Collada Llomena Tuesday afternoon, but even before he had been taken to hospital for assessment, thoughts had turned to whether he could possibly recover in time for the Worlds road race in Zurich on September 29.
The situation was no clearer on Wednesday morning, even if initial scans showed that Van Aert had sustained no fractures in the crash. He was due to fly home to Belgium for further assessment in Herentals, in the same hospital where he underwent surgery in March on the broken collarbone that ended his Classics campaign.
"He had to spend the night in hospital," Niermann explained. "Fortunately, for now, we think that nothing is broken. He had big wounds on his knee that needed a lot of attention, and now he's waiting to travel back to Belgium for further examination.
"He has no fractures, but he has deep wounds, especially on the knee, and that required stitches. As I understand from the doctors, the good news is there are no fractures, but it's still a real injury."
Niermann was reluctant to be drawn on Van Aert's prospects of returning to competition in time to race for Belgium at the European Championships and Worlds later this month. The only certainty at this point is that his rider was clearly in no state to complete the Vuelta after he sustained a deep cut that left him unable to bend his right knee.
"We have no idea yet. It has to be seen," Niermann said. "I haven't seen him, I've only talked to him. But for now, it doesn't look like he'll be on the bike tomorrow."
Comeback
Van Aert has been here before, but that doesn't make the journey back any easier. In March, he endured the hardship of missing out on participation at the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix after he fractured his sternum, ribs and collarbone in the mass crash that marred Dwars door Vlaanderen.
The pathos of that moment was underscored by Van Aert's sobs as he sat on the roadside, and it was hard to shake off the sense that the pain of a broken collarbone was far easier to bear than the agony of missing the Ronde after devoting the previous six months of his life to that one day.
Although he managed to thrash himself into sufficient shape to ride the Tour de France and then claim a bronze medal in the time trial at the Paris 2024 Olympics, it was only on this Vuelta that he truly began to look like the Van Aert of old.
Across two and a half weeks in Spain, Van Aert picked off a hat-trick of stage wins across a variety of terrains, and he was leading both the points and king of the mountains classifications. But more than the victories and the jerseys, it was the style that stood out. After labouring for most of the year – and, indeed, for much of last season too – Van Aert was riding with a freedom and facility unseen since his remarkable, all-action display on the 2022 Tour de France.
But just as he seemed to be himself again, Van Aert was struck down once more by misfortune, a doggedly familiar companion. The headline in Het Nieuwsblad on Wednesday morning said it all: "How much can a rider's head take?"
"For now, of course, he's really down," Niermann said. "He feels really sorry for himself that he has to leave the race. He had big goals. He wanted to win the green jersey and the mountains jersey, and we wanted to win at least another stage with him. And, of course, there are goals for him after this Vuelta, with the European Championships and with the Worlds. It is like this. I know Wout, I know he will come back even stronger – but for now, he's not in the best place."
Vuelta crash
Van Aert's crash on stage 16 came after he had led the break over the summit of the climb of Collada Llomena. He was following Felix Engelhardt (Jayco-Alula) on the descent when the German's wheels slipped from under him on a slippery corner. In attempting to avoid Engelhardt, Van Aert crashed himself, injuring his knee in the process.
The descent of Collada Llomena already had a certain notoriety after red jersey Odd Christian Eiking crashed there when the Vuelta came this way in 2021, but Niermann felt there was no blame to be apportioned either to the route or to Engelhardt.
"Apparently, it happened in the same place where they crashed in 2021," Niermann said. "I have to admit this is a very, very dangerous descent, but especially the part before the crash happened.
"At the road where the crash actually happened, the road had already dried up, so it was a normal road. Of course, it was a technical descent, but it's really a pity in this case, I don't think you can blame anyone.
"The guy in front of Wout crashed and slid out. Wout tried to avoid it and then he hit the wall on the side of the road. It's very unfortunate. Technical descents also belong in cycling, and the really dangerous part was already behind them at that point."
In Van Aert's absence, Jay Vine (UAE Team Emirates) has inherited the mountains jersey while Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Fenix) leads the points classification. For Visma, the main focus of the Vuelta's final days will be trying to move Sepp Kuss, currently 12th at 6:25, further up the standings.
This week last year, Kuss was in the process of winning the Vuelta as Jumbo-Visma filled the podium and claimed a clean sweep of Grand Tour victories. Their 2024 campaign, by contrast, has been punctuated by ill fortune, most notably the crashes suffered by Van Aert and Jonas Vingegaard.
Niermann could only smile wryly when asked about the spate of bad luck visited upon his team this year. "I hope it will stop at one point," he said. "But at least until yesterday, that point was not reached, apparently."
