Power struggle at Soudal - Quick Step: Change of strategy in the Belgian top team?
Andreas Kublik
· 25.03.2023
Power struggle at Soudal - Quick-Step
The years have left their mark on him. Stooped, with a heavy step, the man with the snow-white hair struggles up the few steps to the stage. Patrick Lefevere, the eternal patron of the Belgian racing team, which has a different name almost every year but usually includes Quick Step in its name, now has 68 years on his bones.
Once at the top, he jokes that the best time for a man is at 40, when he is in the prime of his life. That was a while ago for him. But the boss isn't thinking of retiring before the 2023 season. He may not be walking well any more, but he is still full of energy and feisty.
Expectations not fulfilled
On Epiphany Day, when he presented his Soudal - Quick Step team for the 2023 season at the Plopsaland amusement park, he complimented his sponsors well. But then explicitly emphasised: "I have a bad character." And it sounded as if he was proud of it. It is one of his character traits to be in a bad mood when success is not forthcoming. The most successful team in the professional peloton in terms of victories over the years had recently failed to fulfil the boss's expectations in every respect - slipping to sixth place in the team world rankings.
And one was at the centre of his rage: Julian Alaphilippetwice world champion, but pretty unsuccessful last year in a series of failures, bad luck and serious crashes. "He has the salary of a champion, but he also has to prove that he is still one," Lefevere railed in the run-up to the presentation. That wasn't nice - or was evidence of the bad character mentioned.
Soudal - Quick Step: Alaphilippe is counted out
Observers wondered whether Alaphilippe might have worn the corona mask during his appearance at the presentation not because of the risk of infection, but to conceal either the blush of shame or anger on his face at his boss's accusations. After the two-time world champion from France quickly disappeared again and his appearance in front of the journalists was cancelled at short notice due to an alleged illness, an interview with the French sports newspaper L'Equipe appeared shortly afterwards.
Alaphilippe replied that he had never received such criticism from his boss to his face. But the message was that everything else was fine. Not so. Lefevere went on to put even more pressure on his former top athlete. Said nothing? He told the Frenchman explicitly and in the presence of his wife and manager, he said in an interview. And in doing so, he disavowed the former all-time top performer and crowd favourite. But why?
Relentless
Lefevere's incessant back-pedalling in the staff appraisals around the turn of the year came across as particularly harsh and lacking in empathy because the auditorium screen in Plopsaland was showing clips from a rousing documentary about Team Soudal - Quick Step. It showed: A trembling, sobbing Marion Rousse as co-commentator on French television after seeing the horrific images of Alaphilippe, her partner and father of their son, being thrown into the forest at top speed during the Liège-Bastogne-Liège race and lying motionless at the foot of a tree.
"Crashes can't be used as an excuse forever," Lefevere was adamant during the presentation, as if the momentous accident with several broken bones and a complicated lung injury had happened years ago and not just last April.
Soudal - Quick Step: new boss role?
The day in the Ardennes was perhaps the moment of a change of power within the team - and not just in terms of images: Alaphilippe was badly injured on the ground, youngster Remco Evenepoel rode on to victory in the direction of Liège and was celebrated. It was the first act of Remco's big 2022 show and he is the boss's new favourite. And this kind of revamp at the top of the team hierarchy is a tradition under Lefevere's regime. "The usual pressure jolts" was the headline in the French sports newspaper L'Equipe after the patron's verbal attack on the cycling entertainer from France.
Withdrawal of love and vituperative criticism are part of the management style - at least the part that is publicly visible. To summarise and to put it bluntly, you could say: Lefevere likes success, but he likes paying for the consequences much less. After all, a world champion costs a lot of money. But the manager of Soudal - Quick Step often resents that. This has been the case throughout his career as an employer.
Carrot and stick
Whether world champion and Olympic champion Paolo Bettini, Tour of Flanders winner Stijn Devolder or Sam Bennett and Mark Cavendish, who both won several Tour stages and the green jersey: After successful times, he publicly dismantled these stars and showed them the door. Often accompanied by slander - as with Bennett, who he accused of having head problems rather than knee problems.
The examples are legion of how Lefevere uses carrots and sticks to give his racing drivers a leg up, first courting them, then criticising them and finally dismissing them. And then gives the next, often cheaper and/or younger racing drivers the chance to become successful. An eternal cycle. It's worth remembering this at the start of the 2023 cycling season, when Soudal - Quick Step rolls onto the stage with a new protagonist.
While Julian Alaphilippe remains largely behind the scenes on the day of the presentation, Remco Evenepoel, the cycling prodigy, takes the parade of home fans to the nearby Plopsaland amusement park.
Unlike Alaphilippe, he delivered outstanding masterpieces last year: In Spain he won the Vuelta as the first three-week stage race of his career, shortly afterwards he rode an impressive solo to the title of world road champion and replaced his French colleague in the rainbow jersey. "And he can get even better," oracled his boss Lefevere. Not a bold statement - after all, Evenepoel celebrated his 23rd birthday at the beginning of the year. Just a few years ago, racers of this age were only just moving up to the professional ranks.
Soudal - Quick Step: End of an era?
It could be the end of an era - perhaps also signalling a change of strategy for the team that for years was the avant-garde in the spring classics, above all taking a series of stage wins. For Lefevere, the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix the most important races of the year - not the Tour de France. That could change. Finally, after a tussle with the competition, he signed the super-talented Evenepoel as a teenager ahead of the 2019 season and tied him down long-term.
Shortly after his serious crash at the 2020 Tour of Lombardy, the two extended the contract up to and including 2026 - never before had Lefevere signed such a long contract. And it was probably expensive. As a duo, the two are doomed to success - and that will cost a lot of money in the future. Not only is a potential Tour winner like Evenepoel with special star potential already expensive, he also needs a bodyguard for the grand tours, which is a huge expense.
It is no coincidence that the overall standings of the major stage races have recently been won by the professionals of the teams Ineos Grenadiers, Jumbo-Visma and UAE Team Emirates among themselves. These are the teams with the biggest coffers.
Good climbers are expensive
So is there a new strategy at Decolef, the company that runs the Soudal - Quick Step racing team? A kind of transformation from the broad-based classics squad, which has enjoyed numerous successes thanks to its superior numbers in the finals of the one-day races, to a team of cyclists centred around the new leader Evenepoel? "Absolutely!", confirms Klaas Lodewyck, who will be in charge of Evenepoel's selection for the Giro d'Italia as sporting director. "We only have a certain budget. The really good climbers are really expensive," he explains.
In other words, his boss Lefevere has to restructure - make savings somewhere to free up the necessary budget to be able to pay racers of the quality of Sepp Kuss, Rafal Majka, Adam Yates or Brandon McNulty, who are currently Evenepoel's rivals. Jonas Vingegaard or Tadej Pogacar assist.
More class for the same money?
"Our main goal will be to put together a really strong team for Remco. Of course, it would be perfect if we could combine both," confirms Lodewyck - both meaning: classic and tour ambitions. But racers of the calibre of Wout van Aert, Mathieu van der Poel and Tom Pidcock for the classics in addition to a handful of world-class climbers from the same salary pot is likely to be difficult.
"We need at least two new riders for the mountains next year," demands Lodewyck, pointing out that the contracts of 20 riders in the current 29-strong Soudal - Quick Step squad are expiring. Good chances for a reorganisation of the team. This season, only the Czech Jan Hirt (from Intermarche-Wanty) was added as a new noble helper for the mountains - with the recommendation of sixth place overall at the Giro d'Italia 2022.
SummarisedEvenepoel's special ambitions will cost a lot of money in the future, which will have to be saved elsewhere in view of what is rumoured to be a fairly stable budget. Voilà, one could almost assume that Lefevere would like to shift some of Alaphilippe's annual salary - in favour of the young star, who currently seems to have hardly any performance limits.
While nobody knows whether Alaphilippe will return to his old level after his serious crash. And even if he does: Does Lefevere still need him as a highly paid top performer whose ambitions he would have to reconcile with those of the challenger?
A damn long time ago
Especially as Evenepoel could also raise Lefevere's life's work to a higher pedestal. The young Belgian has what it takes to achieve the greatest deed in cycling - winning the Tour de France. They are convinced of this in Belgium. It would be the first victory for a cyclist from the cycling-mad country since 1976 - when Lucien Van Impe triumphed ahead of Joop Zoetemelk and Raymond Poulidor. A bloody long time ago.
For the 30-year-old Alaphilippe, who is currently still under contract with Lefevere's company until 2024, the season that has just begun could be his last big chance. He is as motivated as ever - and particularly relaxed, said the counted-out leader around the start of the season. His first big goal of the season: the Tour of Flanders. It is uncertain whether he will then contest the Ardennes Classics, for years his terrain in the spring. There, too, his rival within the team has ousted him from the leading role.
Evenepoel wins Liège-Bastogne-Liège
Whilst the Frenchman has been fighting for success at Liège-Bastogne-Liège for almost a decade, newcomer Evenepoel snatched victory at the Doyenne last year at the tender age of 22.
Time is running against the old leader of the wolf pack and in favour of the new one. Alaphilippe says he sees no transformation. This year's Tour de France could be his last big appearance in the Quick-Step jersey - as leader of the team alongside sprinter Fabio Jakobsen. Without Evenepoel.
Large stage
"I will enjoy my race there, my way of racing," he emphasises - on home turf, offensive, passionate, accompanied by the euphoria of being France's crowd favourite. Could July 2023 be something of a last chance for him, as the whole world awaits Evenepoel's debut at the most important cycling race the following year? "It's not the question I'm thinking about right now," he says sibyllinically, adding: "If you look at our team at the Giro and the Tour, it's clear that we won't be riding the races the same way."
In Italy, everyone is working for one - for Evenepoel's possible overall victory. In France, sprinter Fabio Jakobsen and stage hunter Alaphilippe will lead the team in a variety of ways. "Remco is riding the Giro for a good overall placing. And he will certainly do the same next year at the Tour," emphasises Alaphilippe. He could also have said: From 2024, the Tour will probably no longer be his, it will no longer be his big stage as a long-time expressionist of cycling - at least if he is still riding in the Team Soudal - Quick Step jersey by then.
Andreas Kublik
Editor
