Four years ago, at the 2018 Road World Championships in Innsbruck, a young Belgian cyclist named Remco Evenepoel announced himself to the cycling world with a remarkable solo victory in the junior road race. Having already won the junior time trial earlier that week, the 18-year-old attacked with 20km of tough Austrian terrain remaining. Evenepoel put his head down, went into time trial mode and comfortably paced himself to the rainbow jersey. The plaudits came quickly: had Belgium found the next Eddy Merckx?
On Sunday, Evenepoel repeated himself on an even grander stage. With barely 30km to go in the elite men’s road race at the 2022 world championships, at the tail-end of a gruelling 266.9km course, Evenepoel and Kazakhstan’s Alexey Lutsenko went off the front of a strong lead group. A few kilometres later, on the penultimate ascent of the short but steep Mount Pleasant climb, Evenepoel attacked solo once more.
