Annemiek van Vleuten: I wouldn't be able to win the Tour de France Femmes in 10 years
Retiring Dutchwoman talks about the pressures of dieting, specialisation in women's cycling and her post-racing plans
Annemiek van Vleuten is bowing out from the professional peloton this week at the Simac Ladies Tour, marking the end of a glittering which has seen her rack up 104 wins.
Her 14-year career has spanned the massive growth in women's racing, her success helping to lift and develop the sport in sao many ways.
However, speaking to NOS this week, the Dutchwoman said that, would she have been racing 10 years into the future, she might not have won the same races she has due to the increasing rise of specialisation in the women's sport.
Van Vleuten, who finished 12th in Tuesday's prologue at the Dutch stage race, imagines a future where she wouldn't be able to win the Tour de France Femmes as she had last season.
"I'm not necessarily a climber by nature," she suggested.
"I wouldn't be able to win the Tour de France Femmes in 10 years, because there will be so many specialists. Actually, I am more of a Flandrien – I am a bit broader built."
Van Vleuten added that she had to reach an "unnatural weight" to compete at races like the Tour, comparing her own experiences with weight with her male colleagues in the peloton.
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"For the Tour, I have to find a bit of an unnatural weight. It is still healthy, but it is not my balanced weight. I have to focus very much on it, weigh everything, to reach the weight with which I want to go to the Tour to win.
"I also see it with my male colleagues. It's a very difficult balance. I've never crossed the line and my performance has always been top. I've never been overtrained. I do feel where the line is, although I have often looked it up."
Van Vleuten has just five race days left of her career, beginning with Wednesday's second stage of the Simac Ladies Tour, a flat day in Gennep. She's won the race twice before, in 2017 and 2018, and also has six stage wins to her name over the years.
After Sunday's final stage in Arnhem, Van Vleuten will turn her focus away from racing and towards her post-retirement life.
She said that she's looking for a "goal oriented" new challenge after she hangs up her wheels.
"Will I miss it? Well, I have a broader image of myself than just that of a world champion or a cyclist," she said.
"I also hear that from my boyfriend. I like that too, otherwise, I would be nobody once I stopped.
"I'm goal oriented. That's how I am and that's how I always race. It's going to be a challenge to look for a new goal in which I can develop myself."
Van Vleuten, who has a master's degree in epidemiology, hasn't confirmed her post-retirement plans. She did say, however, that her future will likely lie away from the well-trodden route of riders switching to the team car as directeurs sportifs or team managers.
"I see myself more as an entrepreneur or someone who can be hired – something in sports, which is my passion. I don't want to be a team leader, because then you get stuck in the same life. You stay away from home a lot; you go to the same hotels... That appeals to me less.
"Having a certain freedom suits me. I've been able to experience many wonderful things through cycling – got to know many people, and raced for different teams in different countries. And it has taken me to training camps in many beautiful places in countries that I wouldn't have seen otherwise. I wouldn't have missed it for anything."
Dani Ostanek is Senior News Writer at Cyclingnews, having joined in 2017 as a freelance contributor and later being hired full-time. Before joining the team, she had written for numerous major publications in the cycling world, including CyclingWeekly and Rouleur. She writes and edits at Cyclingnews as well as running newsletter, social media, and how to watch campaigns.