Patrick Lefevere used his Het Nieuwsblad column to go through the way Jurgen Foré is filling the Soudal Quick-Step roster. The complaint is arithmetic: thirty riders under contract for 2027, the maximum, and thirty-one since the Ben Turner announcement.
“It is a mistake Jurgen can blame himself for. I will not claim it never happened to me once in all those years, but as a CEO you must never tie yourself down this early,” he wrote.
At the centre of the sum, one name: Henrique Bravo. The Brazilian rides this season for the Soudal Quick-Step development team. He won the Giro Valle d’Aosta, finished third at the Giro Next Gen and fifth at the Tour de l’Avenir. Lefevere writes that several teams are interested in the climber and that promoting him to the World Tour squad would be the logical way to counter that interest.
Tying yourself down too early, I know all about it. In January I tick off every Sunday through to June, and in March there is always a ride that lands exactly on the day I can’t go. Same thing in my garage: four bikes inside, the car outside, and it isn’t the garage’s fault. I bought before I measured. Take out the fourth bike and the car fits. I am not taking out the fourth bike.
The arrivals of Ben Turner, Tim Torn Teutenberg and Lorenzo Milesi are already settled for 2027. “That last one especially, I think he is a good signing. I had him on my own list before too,” Lefevere writes about Milesi, in Het Nieuwsblad.
We never counted contracts, we counted the time cut. It’s more restful: there’s a percentage, and the percentage doesn’t change its mind in September.
Xavier folded the paper on the café table, where the argument ran till noon and finished on how many bikes fit in his estate car. On Sunday the ride leaves at nine. He leaves at twenty past nine, with the backpack.
It’s true, we checked: WielerFlits.
