kids these days

men's omloop het nieuwsblad 2023, in brief [spoilers]

There’s a nasty tight corner ahead of the Wolvenberg — it’s one of many Flandrian curves capable of squeezing the peloton into a trickle. Here, the road narrows so precipitously it spits Jumbo Visma’s leader Dylan van Baarle out the back. It just kind of happens that way. One moment the Dutchman is where he needs to be and the next he is displaced with 54 kilometers still to go. That’s Belgium for you.

Up the road, half a minute ahead, the usual suspects: an up and comer, Mathias Norsgaard of Movistar, mingles with various representatives from Continental-level teams; his only World Tour-level compatriot is some kid from Arkea-Samsic named Mathis Le Berre. It will surely soon be curtains for them. And for Lotto-Dstny’s young prodigy Arnaud De Lie, who, round that same bend, suffers a need for a new bike. All this is happening too close to the decisive moment, which, this late in a race like Omloop, could be any moment.

Belgium seems remarkably green after having watched all those races in the Middle East. The Flandrian countryside is peppered alternatively with banal houses and the country’s perplexing flavor of modern architecture. Brutalist churches and fire stations in strange shapes. People wave flags and camp out in lawn chairs. Drinks are consumed. Cycling has rather visibly returned home for Opening Weekend — even the holdouts among us can no longer run from the new calendar. The fans and riders are both fresh-faced, except for perhaps Arnaud De Lie, who has already appeared in five races, winning thrice.

In the peloton, some shuffling occurs. Jumbo Visma and Lotto-Dstny retrieve their men, bring them back into the fold, take big pulls, narrowing the doomed gap. Finally, on a stretch of cobbles with 38k to go, men hit the throttle. There is dust, screaming. When all settles, a fatal exchange has been made: the breakaway trades all but one of its riders for Van Baarle, the heavyset Bahrain Victorious sprinter Jonathan Milan, and De Lie’s teammate Florian Vermeersch. Left in the mix from the break is young Mathis Le Berre, 21, from rainy Brittany. The gap between this new group and the peloton widens, though others try to follow. Milan is the first to go backwards, on the Berendries. It’s not surprising. For reasons known only to him, he did a number of pulls, despite the fact that van Baarle, the favorite, was there. Chalk it up to youth.

I can’t imagine what it must feel like being Mathis Le Berre in this moment. He’s young, a race debutante, strong but unknown to those of us who don’t follow the Under 23s, where he secured several top ten finishes and a GC win in the Tour de Normandie last year. He’s sitting in the wheel of the guy who won Paris-Roubaix from a long-range breakaway during a phase of the race where such attempts are fast approaching. By this point in the day’s proceedings, Le Berre appears a little careworn; his race numbers comically askew on his back, dirt plastered across his broad, hairless face. The expectations for him have already been far exceeded and he should be satisfied. But he persists quietly for many kilometers. More than persists. Van Baarle kicks, Vermeersch disappears.

Only Le Berre follows.

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The Muur is an ugly hill if you’re a bike tire. Knobby cobbles caged in by a throng of fans, some lighting flares, obscuring the road, blanketing the view of the stately yet little church that marks the summit, its congregation all outside, well aware of the location’s holy significance. Van Baarle, wizened and sure of himself, winds up his jolt midway through the climb and for a few meters Le Berre, once more and with great dignity, latches on. But then something sad happens. Le Berre’s legs begin to spin far too fast for the terrain he’s on. His chain has slipped. He disappears into the flare-fog. This is not fair, but nothing is on the Muur. However, despite his untimely end, we will remember Le Berre as a major protagonist of this race, a race in which he’s just made his first appearance. His name will be highlighted on further startlists. He does not know that this, in itself, is a victory.

Despite the other groups lingering beind, one has the sinking feeling that Van Baarle will never come back. That’s his style, his win condition. Perhaps his conflict doesn’t lie so much in the race itself but within the subtle Machiavellian drama within the ranks of his team, which has brought, via the likes of Tratnik, Van Hooydonck and Laporte, a rocket launcher to Omloop’s knife fight. Speculation reigns as to whether these early races are being gifted to Van Baarle in exchange for his help in securing victory for Van Aert in the Tour Flanders and Paris-Roubaix. We will not know the truth until later.

Meanwhile, the world is on Arnaud De Lie’s shoulders. He’s been pulling his team out of the relegation trenches since his debut last year, when he claimed an astounding twenty-nine top-tens and nine wins, most of them in a number of small one-day races. On air, the talking heads on Sporza are inflating his personage by the minute. De Lie is in the big leagues. This is Omloop, Opening Weekend, and he’s had to contend with bad luck: mechanicals at crucial times. That pesky bike change. His team is disorganized and what organization they’re able to get going is futile compared to that of their rivals. With 13 kilometers to go, he decides things are best left in his own hands.

On the slopes of the Muur, De Lie crawls off the front with a group including February strongman Tim Wellens (now at UAE Team Emirates), the great trickster Matej Mohorič, and Van Baarle’s teammate Christophe Laporte, who is rather angry that no one is working with him. (And why should they?) There’s only twelve seconds between these four and the front of the race. But as all cycling enthusiasts know, this is a very different kind of twelve seconds than those found on a stopwatch. This variety of twelve seconds is elastic. It stretches and intimidates and fumbles attempts to get closer because the rider ahead takes a curve and is once more out of sight. The lack of urgency turns into urgency only when it’s far too late. Laporte’s policing doesn’t help. It is in temporal purgatories like these where the race is lost, or, more accurately, is simply not won. The talking heads grow angrier. So does De Lie.

Van Baarle, meanwhile, paces himself. He seems completely unconcerned, neutral. Not even pleased, that is until he reaches the end of the road, sees no one behind him, and posts up, brandishing what must be the best investment ever made by Jumbo Supermarkets and whatever it is Visma does. Spreadsheet software. Finally, one sees a smile beneath that blond mustache.

Soon after, the peloton fills the screen. De Lie launches his sprint early, on the righthand side. He remains there, stubbornly, persistently, strongly. Others surge and fade, but De Lie is powered by grit and more than a little spite. He throws his bike ahead of Laporte, ruining the photo op of a Jumbo 1-2. He casts himself into decisive relevance. He makes an announcement, his very posture screaming, fuck you.

Let me be clear, I like Dylan van Baarle. He is a crafty rider, very good at negotiating, very good at riding his own race. His wins appear easy, though of course they are not. He’s repeated here the same triumph Wout Van Aert executed last year using almost exactly the same playbook. Yet in this edition, it was the others who keep us waiting til the end. De Lie. Le Berre, who finishes 23rd. Indeed, it appears the generational tides are turning in the classics as they already have in the grand tours. However, even with De Lie and Laporte on either side of him, it is still Van Baarle who looks out victorious upon the crowd.

Kids these days, I would think, if I were him.

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If anyone wants to read more cycling writing in between now and Kuurne Brussels Kuurne, over the off-season I wrote a novella set in the EPO era, which can be found here.