It’s not often I open an article with the headline coming from a lyric created by 1990’s hardcore techno act Scooter, but these are different times.
Cycling is back however with racing over the weekend in Italy with Strade Bianche and today in Lombardy.
Being a fan of Belgian riders, especially those with a cyclo cross slant, you could be forgiven for not getting too far past the performance of Wout Van Aert at the weekend.
He proved once and for all that there is more to converts from the mud and dirt than Mathieu Van der Poel and Zednek Stybar.
His dominant performance in dispatching a group of known grand tour and classics stars was a win for all ages. It was all the better for us having had such a wait to see it.
But down the results list and in the breakaway today is the name of a rider who is going under the radar but is impressing.
The next cab of the rank was likely to be Tim Merlier who was starting his transition to the road and was present in the opening weekend of Flemish classics back in February. But for me Quinten Hermans could be the better bet.
He was up there without being super impressive on the rough stuff in the winter, but has settled in with Wanty/Circus since the restart. He is clearly able to get in a move and hang in until the latter stages of big races.
I will be keeping an eye on him as I think a breakthrough win could be coming soon.
Fendrien 