René Remco Evenepoel wants to wear the yellow jersey at the Tour de France and thinks Tadej Pogacar will lose the lead eventually: “There will definitely come a day that this will no longer be the case”

Remco Evenepoel is still healing from major injuries he got a few weeks ago when he crashed into the door of an open van during a training session. He isn’t as ready for the 2025 season as he would like to be, but his Tour de France is still safe. He wants to wear the yellow shirt during the first week of the Grand Boucle next year. He thinks that the Slovenian will eventually feel the pressure, which could be used by rivals.

The first week of the Tour is full of exciting stages and a time trial that lasts a long time. He should be in great shape to win this. The most important goal of the Tour de France is to win the time trial in stage 5. Today is a big day for him. We know that a yellow shirt is likely to be up for grabs there,” Evenepoel told Eurosport. “I think my first goal is to not waste any time in the first four stages and then win the yellow in the fifth stage.” We’ll take it one day at a time after that, just like we did in the 2022 Vuelta.

As he has said before, his goal is the most important thing at the Tour right now, and he is very focused on it. It would be nice to wear the yellow shirt. At least once I have to wear it. There are no hills or climbs in the time trial. I think I’ll do well in the time trial, and I need to aim for the top spot to make a big gap.

Evenepoel might run in the Giro d’Italia, but because of his injury, it’s not likely that he will do both. That’s why Primoz Roglic chose this race, but that doesn’t mean that any other big GC rider will do the same, especially one as young as the Soudal-Quick-Step winner.

Evenepoel thinks he might have done a little better on the Tour if he hadn’t been hurt in the crash at Itzulia Basque Country last spring. “Three weeks, I couldn’t ride my bike. Even though the collarbone was fine, the shoulder blade was badly hurt. It was a rush because I only had two months to get in great shape. I hope that this year I learn more and get ready better. If I hadn’t crashed, I might have ended five or six minutes behind Pogacar.

He says that winning the Tour is something he can’t really picture himself doing: “It’s not that I’m a bad climber; most of the time I came in third at the top.” The fact that they were able to climb shows that they have the ability to do so. Of course, it’s up to me to work on that even more and make sure I don’t fall before the Tour so that my training goes as smoothly as possible. But that’s only if everything works out as planned for Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard.

Injuries have slowed down both of them in the weeks leading up to the Tour the last two years. “Pogacar was so good this year that we never saw him get nervous. He was ahead of all the other riders.” It’s certain that this will no longer be the case one day. “Hopefully that will be next year,” Evenepoel says, starting the mental fight for the yellow jersey six months before the Grand Depart in Lille.