Jurgen van den Broeck carries pride of Belgium
Coming ito the 2010 Tour de France, Jurgen van den Broeck was glowing from a recent promotion to team captain, and aiming for a top 10 finish. His Belgian-based team Omega Pharma-Lotto recently lost Cadel Evans, last year’s team leader, to BMC-Racing. Little did they know, this would prove to be a stroke of luck, as Evans has dropped off, while Broeck has stayed in the top five overall since stage eight.
Australian contender Evans stands in 22nd overall, and in 17th in the green jersey competition, but these standings are mostly thanks to outstanding performance in the 3rd and 8th stages. A sixth place finish won him a yellow jersey in the 8th stage and sparked some riders to call this year’s Tour a three-way race between Evans, Andy Schleck and Alberto Contador. While Schleck held the yellow jersey for six consecutive stages before two-time Tour winner Contador narrowly took the lead in the 15th stage, Evans suffered an injury in his yellow-jersey stage which has left him in no shape to compete for the top ten.
"I'm disappointed for myself, but also of the team. They hoped to do well and so did I," said Evans on the Silence-Lotto web site. "I felt things hadn't been going well for the past few days. I hoped that it would go better. I could not do anything as Schleck attacked."
Broeck, on the other hand, has done a great job of filling Evans’ shoes. The Belgian has maintained his fifth place overall through the first two days of the Pyrenees, and has no intention of giving it up. In the 14th stage he gained time on his two closest rivals Levi Leipheimer and Robert Gesink, and he now stand alone in the three minute gap between those two opponents and the top 4 contenders. With almost a minute and a half between the top five and the chasers, Broeck has every reason for confidence.
"I've proven I can go top 10 in the Giro and now I will try for the same in the Tour. I'm also looking to the future; this year I'm 27, so I still have some years to improve. Cadel, too, started in this team by making his goal top-ten and then each year higher and higher. It's a year earlier that he left the team, but we'll make the best of it."
The Belgian’s presents in the general classification has come as something of a surprise. This is not because his professional career has been less-than-impressive – he finished 15th in the 2009 Tour de France and finished top ten in two tours earlier this year – but since he has ridden as support for most of his career, nobody anticipated his leadership skills. It seems a sure thing that he will better his performance of last year, but the ambitious rider – he declared his top ten goal before the Tour began – is also modest.
"I'm still going for the top 10. It would be stupid to think it's over already, there's still a week of racing left; anything can happen," he told Cyclingnews. In response to his dropping the Tour leader in the 14th stage, he replied, “I only thought about reaching the top."
Broeck remained ahead of the favourites throughout the Alps – always just behind the leading team but ahead of the peloton. Slowly but surely, he climbed higher and higher in the rankings.
"To me there are only three mountain stages left. The stage to Pau [stage 16] is a very tough stage but for the general classification it shouldn't be taken into account. The Peyresourde will hurt at the beginning but the other stages are much more important."
The Belgian’s fifth place is well deserved, as is his country’s pride in him. Belgian cycling hasn’t has a great contender for which to cheer in a long time, but it looks like the 27-year old Van den Broeck can fill that space for years to come.
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