Victor Campenaerts is one of the peloton's most engaging talkers, and his gift of the gab extends to social media, where his offbeat daily video diary with Lotto-Dstny roommate Jasper De Buyst has gathered something of a cult following on this Tour de France.
The former Hour Record holder is also well capable of expressing himself on the bike, of course, as a palmarès with two European time trial titles and a stage win at the Giro d'Italia testifies. On stage 18, Campenaerts showcased his strength by playing a key role in helping the breakaway unexpectedly fend off the sprinters in Bourg-en-Bresse.
Campenaerts spent most of the finale sacrificing himself on behalf of teammate Pascal Eenkhoorn, the faster of the two Lotto-Dstny riders in the four-man move. Although Eenkhoorn ultimately had to settle for second place behind winner Kasper Asgreen (Soudal-QuickStep), Campenaerts could draw some satisfaction from the part he played in ensuring the escapees upset the odds and held off the bunch.
The Belgian explained afterwards that the stage had worked out precisely as planned for Lotto-Dstny, save for the final metres, where Asgreen had just a little too much for Eenkhoorn in the sprint.
"On the bus, we had a clear plan. We just had to be in the breakaway today, there was no other option," said Campenaerts, who duly escaped in the opening kilometres with Asgreen and Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X). "We said if it was a ten-man breakaway, we would go full for me, but if it was four guys or less, then we'd go very easy and send someone across halfway through the stage."
Easier said than done, but Lotto-Dstny managed to pull it off, with the leading trio's advantage never climbing beyond 1:48. With 65km remaining, and despite the obvious discouragement from green jersey Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck), who attempted to block the move, Eenkhoorn attacked from the peloton.
Out ahead, meanwhile, Campenaerts dropped back to pace his teammate across to the break. "From this moment we put the pace on, and we worked very well, there was good collaboration in the group," he explained.
In the final hour of racing, a coalition of sprinters' teams – including Alpecin-Deceuninck, Jayco-Alula and Lidl-Trek – worked to reel in the escapees. The flat terrain and open roads hardly helped their cause, nor did they headwind, but they stuck resolutely to their task.
With 20km to go, the gap was 40 seconds, and their race seemed run. With 10km remaining, it was down to 20 seconds, and still they persisted. By now, Asgreen's Soudal-QuickStep teammates were occasionally hindering the pursuit behind, but the escapees' task still looked a forlorn one.
"The peloton came quite fast and on paper, it was 100% a sprint stage, with big roads and a lot of headwind, but we were pushing it very hard and fast on these flat roads," said Campenaerts, who ordered Eenkhoorn to spare himself as best he could on the run-in.
"What was I thinking? Ride as fast as possible. From 10k to go, it was clear we would have to fight to the last metres to stay in front, and from this moment I said to Pascal, 'You have to sprint,' so I did long and fast pulls. I could feel Abrahamsen and Kasper were doing good pulls, too, they never skipped one, but they also had in their minds that they also had to sprint. We had two riders, so that meant we had to be responsible in the breakaway."
1500m or so from the finish, Campenaerts took it upon himself to provide a long final turn on the front with the aim of providing a lead-out for Eenkhoorn. The effort probably ensured the break fended off the bunch, though he admitted that he hadn't been able to tee up his teammate quite as he had planned.
"I tried to lead out from far out because we expected a fast sprint to be better for Pascal, but I cramped up a bit with 500m to go so it ended up being a slower sprint," he said. "But chapeau to Kasper. He's a very strong rider, a Tour of Flanders winner, so he is strong. Of course, we aimed for victory, but we were second. That's the story of the day."
Not quite. When Campenaerts reached the finish, he learned that he had been voted the day's most combative rider. He would not end the day entirely empty-handed. "It is never easy to get on the podium of the Tour de France," he said, but this was no time for false modesty. "It's well deserved. I would have found it strange if it had gone to someone else…"
