Senna Remijn (20) explains what happened after his lights went out on the Cauberg

The rider from Zeeland went with the group behind Remco Evenepoel, Mattias Skjelmose, Romain Grégoire, Kévin Vauquelin and Matteo Jorgenson on the Kruisberg. “I really had very good legs,” said last year’s runner-up in the under-23 edition of Liège-Bastogne-Liège after the finish.

Those good legs did run out at a certain point, Remijn admitted with a laugh. “On the Keutenberg I was already really struggling. Together with Emiel (Verstrynge, who eventually finished fifth, ed.) I had to let go there for a moment. We were just able to come back, but on the Cauberg I completely locked up. I couldn’t go anymore.”

“I then rode another ten or fifteen kilometres solo behind that group, but after the Bemelerberg I was brought back by the peloton,” continued Remijn, who eventually rolled across the line in 57th place, 3:54 behind Evenepoel. “I was completely empty and had nothing left. I had to drop on the Cauberg and at that point I just wasn’t quite good enough anymore.”

“I did surprise myself, being able to stay with them for so long,” was his final conclusion. “The plan was for me to ride the finale and I did believe I could do that, but it’s always a bit of a wait-and-see whether it actually works out.”

“It was my first race over 200 kilometres, I had never done that before,” he recalled. “I don’t even think I had ever ridden that far before. The longest must have been around 200 kilometres.”

“I can definitely be satisfied with this. It’s not something I had done before,” Remijn concluded. “And I learned from it. What did I learn? That you can really blow yourself up.”