On Sunday in Montreal, the men’s race runs a day after the women’s, as usual, and Rik knows the drill: it’s always on Sunday that the back-office, at the rear, has the most work to do. Two leaders in the same jersey, to him, never means twice the chances. It means two race plans, and for the domestique who rides back to the team car, two pockets to fill at once.
At the front, I couldn’t tell you who’s in charge between the two, and I’m not sure they know themselves before the last hour. At the back, I can tell you what it looks like: in the car, we fill eight bidons for one and eight for the other, and the one who rides back doesn’t know anymore which pocket goes with which. They say Belgium has two leaders. I say they’ve got two pockets, and one back to carry them both.
Paul Seixas, for his part, sees it from a distance, and from a distance things always look simpler. Two leaders, for a Frenchman racing against them, makes for a team that doesn’t need to choose. For Rik, who spent two and a half seasons never seeing the front of a race, it mostly makes for a team that will have to choose anyway, just later, and without saying so on television.
Thomas Voeckler, on the other side, warned that focusing only on Belgium would be a mistake, that plenty of other rivals remain. Rik agrees with him, in his own way, from the back of the race.
He’s right, the French sports director. On television you only ever watch the jersey that attacks. The office, at the back, watches everyone the same way, because the time cut shows no mercy to anybody, favourite or not. That much, at least, doesn’t get argued over between two leaders.
On Sunday evening, people will say Belgium had two cards to play. Rik will mostly remember that they had twice as many bidons to carry, and that no camera ever shows that work. Back home in Ronse, when two lads from the club both wanted to win on the same day, it was always the third one, the one carrying the musettes, who ended up the most tired.
On Sunday, we’ll find out who was carrying whose bidons. In the meantime, the Ronse club car has only one leader, and it’s whoever’s in front at the red light.
It’s true, we checked: Sporza.
