Soete on younger years with Van Aert: "Then we had one night to drink and party as much as we wanted"

Soete and Van Aert both hail from Herentals but first met at a youth race. "The first race I ever did against Wout was just a ten-minute drive from my house," Soete begins. "We didn’t know each other back then. I had a mountain bike, and Wout already had a cyclo-cross bike. I finished second, and Wout won. He was already part of a small youth team, and my parents asked if I could join too. From that moment on, we became best friends. We were only nine years old."

At that age, they were technically too young to compete officially, but there was a workaround. "We would go to the Netherlands every week to race for fifteen minutes," Soete shares. "Afterward, we’d head into the woods and watch the older guys riding. We were already racing against Mathieu van der Poel and the Sweeck brothers (Laurens and Diether, ed.)."

After retiring as professional cyclists, Van Aert and Soete might well consider a second career as cyclo-cross course designers. They gained plenty of experience just for fun during their younger years. "We lived close to each other, and there weren’t many boys into cyclo-cross in our area. Every Wednesday, we’d meet up to create cyclo-cross courses, either at my place or his. I lived near a forest. We’d make a sand section, but it would quickly harden—not like real beach sand. It was our great passion."

Soete and Van Aert’s big idol was former top cyclo-cross racer Bart Wellens. "Our hero was Bart Wellens because he lived just a kilometer away from us. We’d often ring his doorbell to ask if he had any spare socks for us. Sometimes we’d get socks, or his dad would give us a few tubes to practice changing. Those are great memories."

When asked about his greatest mentor, Soete credits Kris Wouters. "He was the team leader at Telenet-Fidea during our junior years. If we hadn’t had him, Wout van Aert, Quinten Hermans, and I might not be pros today," Soete says. "He kept us on the right path. As 16-year-olds on a youth camp in Mallorca, things could’ve gotten wildly out of hand without someone strict like Wouters—and even then, they sometimes did."

"We also pushed our boundaries without him knowing," Soete continues. "And we had Hans van Kasteren (team boss). During every camp, we were allowed one night to drink and party as much as we wanted. He paid for everything. Kris wasn’t too happy about it—he wanted us home by midnight. So what do you do? You drink as much as possible in two hours. I’m not sure that was any better. But I’m glad I experienced that era of cycling. You can’t imagine that happening now."

Wout van Aert secured his first cyclo-cross victory of the season on January 4 in Gullegem. The Belgian rider for Visma | Lease a Bike outperformed Belgian champion Eli Iserbyt after an intense final. With the spring classics in mind, Van Aert is following a compact cyclo-cross schedule. He will also compete in the World Cups in Dendermonde (January 5, 2025), Benidorm (January 19), and Maasmechelen (January 25).