Wout Van Aert has a simple wish for 2025, combined with lofty goals and an appeal for gear restrictions in pro races to help reduce high-speed crashes.
After his 2024 season was wrecked by two major crashes and complex injuries, the Visma-Lease a Bike rider hopes to avoid a similar fate in 2025. He has clear ambitions of returning to fight in the Classics and Tour de France sprints.
"Stay on my bike," Van Aert said with his usual sense of dry humour when asked by Sporza, during an interview at his home near Antwerp in northern Flanders.
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"I want to be able to take part in the races I want to take part in. Because having to watch all the big Classics and events in 2025 is enough for me."
Van Aert turns 30 in September and hopes to look back on 2025 with a victory at the Tour of Flanders or Paris-Roubaix on his palmares.
"I dream of being able to look back in a year and have a victory at the Tour of Flanders or Paris-Roubaix. That is my priority," he said.
Van Aert crashed at close to 70km/h during Dwars door Vlaanderen as riders fought for position before the Kanarieberg climb. It has been removed from the 2025 race but Van Aert believes a limit on gear sizes would increase safety in the professional peloton.
The speed of the men's professional peloton has gradually increased, and so too have the gears. Riders increasingly opt for bigger chainrings for mechanical efficiency and to give them a choice of even bigger gears.
The UCI removed gear restrictions for Junior riders on January 1, 2023 but Van Aert is convinced that some kind of restriction in the peloton would improve safety even if pre-race checks would be needed.
"It is a crucial point in the race and a small mistake there is never a 'fall'," Van Aert said of his crash before the Kanarieberg climb during Dwars door Vlaanderen.
"It's made an interesting debate among the riders because cycling is getting faster. Limiting the gears would make the sport a lot safer, in my opinion. Other riders don't think so but I'm convinced about it. If you are on that descent with a gear limit, no one can move up. Now the gears are so big that you still think about overtaking."
Van Aert's second major crash came in the Vuelta a España after an impressive come-back via the Tour de France and silver in the time trial at the Paris Olympic Games. He won three stages at the Vuelta but crashed into a rockface on stage 16. He suffered massive cuts and damage to his right knee, with scars still visible on the Visma-Lease a Bike team photographs.
"The fall wasn't serious at all. The bad luck was that there was a rock face. It literally cut into me," Van Aert explained.
"At first I thought about the sporting loss in the Vuelta but that changed when I didn't feel well in the ambulance and then because of the serious knee damage that was diagnosed in Belgium. If there had been grass, I could have just continued in the Vuelta."
Van Aert struggled with yet another long spell of injury rehabilitation and so opted to ride a reduced cyclocross campaign this winter so he can be at his best in the spring Classics.
"I had no desire to start that rehabilitation at all. I had no energy left to start from scratch again. That was a difficult period," he admitted.
"How did I get started? I had little choice."
Van gradually returned to training in the off-season, working in the gym to rebuild the strength in his knee. He finished fourth in the Azencross in December and will next race on Saturday at the Superprestige Gullegem. He will not ride the Cyclocross World Championships, prioritising his road racing as he turns 30.
"I'm almost worn out in racing terms,"
Van Aert joked about his age.
"But I don't believe that, although the end is closer than the beginning. Though that birthday really hit home. I know for sure that talent doesn't go away, even after so many setbacks, I still reached a high level in the fall, so that will probably come back."
