“I told Julian that if he was tired of the environment, he could leave us”
If the program officially revealed on Friday by his team will open on the Challenge de Mallorca before the Drôme and Ardèche Classics then the Italian triptych Strade-Tirreno-Sanremo, it could well then have a very Flandrian accent. The ex-double world champion could indeed also align himself with the E3 GP and A Travers la Flandre. On the other hand, it is not yet certain that he will then compete in the Ardennes classics. “Loulou” could skip the Walloon Flèche and Liège-Bastogne-Liège to better prepare for his second objective of the season: the Tour de France. It must be said that the Grande Boucle will start from the Basque Country, offering several tailor-made stages during the first week of racing.
Alaphilippe knows in any case expected by his boss Patrick Lefevere who had already blown this winter that “when you have a champion’s salary, you have to perform like a champion”. A speech that the Flandrian manager added on Friday. “He had some bad luck, it’s true, but you can’t hide behind that for too long. I want to see the Julian of two years ago again. I had a frank and sincere discussion with him and made him understand that if he was tired of an environment in which he had been living since he was 17, he could leave us, but he told me he wanted to stay in the team.”