That may not happen again soon, and the team has not had a bad year at all with now 16 victories. But van Aert, returning from a serious knee injury sustained in the Vuelta, has To add to his problems, he fell ill a week before the start of the Giro and was still suffering the effects of the illness when the race started. So, after finishing second on stage 2 behind Mads Pedersen, he faded badly, misjudging a leadout for the team’s sprinter, Olav Kooij, and seemingly short on legs.
But he took a big victory on Sunday’s stage 9 of the race, after a crash on a white gravel sector slowed most of the peloton and left him in a six-rider lead group that the bunch never caught. He then beat the surprise race leader, Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates–XRG), in a sprint in Siena. Then, on Thursday’s stage 12, after teammate Edoardo Affini brought van Aert and Kooij in position at the head of the peloton, the 31-year-old Belgian rode an astonishing lead-out of some 700 meters to bring his sprinter in position, and Kooij did the rest, winning his second Giro stage and recording the fortieth professional victory of his career. Not bad at all for a 23-year-old.
“We were waiting for this one, or I was waiting,” he told TNT afterwards. “We grew into the race as a team with Simon [Yates] being in a good position, Wout taking that stage win… In the other two sprints, I didn’t go right, so I’m really happy that today we could do it.”
“You know the saying You win or you learn,” van Aert . “And on the last few occasions, we didn’t win. But, of course, we learnt from it, and today we stayed more calm and that’s how Edo, Olav and I could use each other.”
As for Yates, who came to Visma at the beginning of the year and has had lacklustre performances, he has looked strong here and currently sits fifth, only 1:11 behind del Toro. If his form holds up, he could present his team with a Grand Tour podium finish, which would be a big confidence booster ahead of the Tour de France.