Almost all the top teams work hard with their youth sector. Visma-Laese a Bike is a model, but Bora-Hansgrohe is no exception, especially with its Grenke Auto Eder, junior satellite team. The team is moving well. UAE Emirates and we all still have in mind the 13 pros who in three years took Groupama-Fdj from the continental to the first team. Among the teams that leverage the youth sector there is also the Lotto Dstny (top photo @facepeeters).
The Belgian team has radically changed its organization. After leaving the WorldTour, it also adopted a different strategy to rejoin: from chasing points to scouting riders, above all. For example, to date the Belgian team is the first professional in the UCI ranking and seventh overall, one step away from giants like Ineos Greandiers and Soudal-Quick Step, ahead of Bora-Hansgrohe and Groupama-Fdj.
His devoted team has produced several top athletes, most recently Arnaud De Lie, Lennert Van Eetvelt e Maxim Van Gils. And even if De Lie isn't going through a great moment (he will also miss the Flanders tournament), he still remains an important talent.
Kurt Van de Wouwer is the sports manager of Lotto Dstny, he follows the pros, but also the young people. He's the one in charge of the guys and their way of working. And he's the one we turned to to learn more. From the professional to the “kids” of Crabbé-Dstny juniors, the Lotto-Dstny sector is quite broad. And active.
Mr. Van de Wouwer, let's start with the three "children" of your youth academy. How much have these boys grown?
De Lie, Van Eetvelt and Van Gils come from our development team. Every year they have made good progress. Arnaud De Lie, in his first seasons as a professional, immediately won several races. Van Gils has also already improved a lot; last year he achieved good results in the Walloon classics, and this year he obviously made even more progress, winning the Ruta del Sol and finishing third at the Strade Bianche. The same goes for Van Eetvelt, who won the last stage of theUAE Tour and with it also the general classification of theUAE Tour. So already excellent results for all of them.
And what margins do they have?
How much more can they grow? It's hard to predict, but obviously we are sure that they will make progress.
How do you recruit juniors to your devo team? People often tend to look at the finish order (the ranking)… does this still apply to you?
When recruiting riders for the Lotto-Dstny Devo Team, we consider several factors. The watts they push are important, as are the results, of course. But let's also try to understand whether they already live as 100 percent professionals or whether they still have room for improvement in this respect. These are some of the things we take into account.
So how do you understand that a junior is strong, that he is valid, even if he hasn't achieved great results?
Results are one of the things we consider when recruiting a junior. But that's not all. If, for example, we see that they're really strong in the race, that they're making it tough, that they're really pushing, that they're attacking... even if they're not getting results, that's something we take into account. In short, it's not just on the basis of results that we explore cyclists. Sometimes a guy who isn't that tactically intelligent in the junior category becomes so thanks to years of experience and this can make the difference even later on.
Bora-Hangrohe, through its junior team Grenke Auto Eder, is organizing five days of testing: not only on the bike but also in the gym. At Visma they are also looking at other sports (cross-country skiing with Nordhagen): how do you do it?
We also do tests and before that let's bring some kids to our training camps.
Do your Devo Team members live together in a "little house"? Or do they each have their own homes?
We have many options for a rider to live in Belgium for a longer period.
How many hours of training per week do they normally do?
It depends on whether they are still in school or not. However, it can vary from 15 to 30 hours, depending on their situation and also their age.
In Belgium there are no long climbs, but we remember for example Van Eetvelt going very strong in the U23 Giro on the Colle della Fauniera: how and where do they train for the climb?
Starting from the junior category they train abroad, in Spain for example. Of course, in Belgium we're a bit limited with long climbs.
Who are the next guys we'll see move from the devo team to the first team?
We have a lot of talent in the team, we'll see how they develop.
