Van Avermaet seems to be on his way up again, following two difficult years. He finished third in yesterday's stage of the Tour de Suisse and is eyeing the Belgian road title, to be fought out in a week from Sunday.
To wear the black, yellow and red jersey for a year would be fantastic for Van Avermaet. "I dream of the driekleur [three colors]," the Omega Pharma-Lotto rider told Sporza after the stage.
He will have a lot of competition on June 27 in Leuven, east of Brussels. The opponents will come from other teams, but even his own squad has several candidates for the win. "I know that it won't be simple with [Philippe] Gilbert in the team. I can't say that we really click, but we need to shake hands. I have definitely shown that I can work for him."
Van Avermaet had his breakout season in 2008, when he had several good placings and a few wins, including a stage in the Vuelta a España. He also won the points classification in the three-week long Grand Tour through Spain. He was considered the next Belgian star, who would be also capable of taking big classics victories. He and Jürgen Roelandts were supposed to solidify the future for Omega Pharma Lotto.
But things turned out differently, as both youngsters had a difficult 2009 season. For the last two years, the Belgian team had an extremely difficult time to get the first win of the season, and some of the performances in the Belgian classics were outright disastrous. It was Gilbert who had to save the team's 2009 with four back to back wins at the end of the season, including the Giro di Lombardia.
In 2010 it took until April 18 for the first win to arrive, again through Gilbert. It was another big victory, the Amstel Gold Race. Despite all that, Van Avermaet doesn't see that he was that bad in the past two seasons. "If the good old Van Avermaet is back? Was he ever gone?" Van Avermaet answered the question with a question.
"For me there was not much difference, except that I could not get any results." If you are the sprinter of the team, however, you are expected to win a few races and Van Avermaet hasn't managed to do that. But yesterday he was in the day's break, even though he had to settle for third. Marcus Burghardt had taken a 50km solo to win and Oscar Freire beat Van Avermaet in the sprint of the chase group.
The result shows that Van Avermaet is getting close to the top again. "A Belgian title could make up for a lot of it," he says with confidence.
Van Avermaet joined the Lotto team in 2007, moving up from the continental team Bodysol - Win for Life - Jong Vlaanderen, which is also sponsored by Omega Pharma. In his year ProTour year he won four races, including a stage in the Tour of Qatar. His Vuelta stage win in 2008 came again in breakaway, but he proved on other occasions that he could also take a field sprint. A win in the Nationals and all the hardship and criticism of the last two years would quickly vanish.