Photo: ETIXX-QUICK STEP / TIM DE WAELE
Patrick Lefevere has earned for years the reputation of being a guy without hairs in the tongue and with an acidity without limits in his comments towards cyclists from other teams, but also of his own team. However, in his Nieuwsblad week column, former Soudal Quick-Step manager has been more human than ever and has shown immense admiration for Mikel Landa.
«I am not the most sensitive person in the world, but My heart bleeds seeing Mikel Landa hitting so strong. The number one leader of our team leaves, but that’s what worries me least. Seeing Mikel in the ambulance makes me only think about him, and not in the race, ”he began explaining the old cycling shark.
Moreover, Lefevere himself recognizes that he misunderstood the role that the corridor could represent: «I thought it was someone closed, introverted, and in the end it has been the opposite of an ‘island’ within the team. Talk to everyone and get along with everyonefrom Remco Evenepoel to Junior LCEF. I don’t think there are many runners who can say that they haven’t learned something from Mikel. If this is the case, it is his fault, not Mikel’s ».
Lefevere adds as a closure: «Mikel is someone special, who does things in his own way. He is a good professional, although sometimes he cooks him with a cigar or a whiskey. In the ‘Lefevere scale’, points are added instead of subtracting them with those things, whenever it is just a glass of whiskey and not a bottle. And Landa never fighters with a bottle. Of course it is difficult to think that it will be on the Tour with Remco, but the truth is that the only thing that matters to me right now is: «Wait soon, friend«. These words, coming from the man of the heart of iron, mean a lot and certify the level of appreciation that Mikel Landa has added within Soudal Quick-Step, a team with which he has a contract signed by 2026.
