DRIES DEVENYNS
The Quick Step rider on living in Kwaremont but not racing there
At first I was a football player and I would run,
but I had a brother who was a cyclist and an uncle as well and then one day or another I did it myself; I stopped playing football and I started cycling when I was 15. I was playing in the local football club; I was pretty good, but I didn’t see a future in it.
I was born in Leuven but raised in Kwaremont.
It was quite special living there because of the cobbles and the big riders passing quite frequently at the doorstep. But I was not typical, I was not really part of the cycling community... I didn’t know anybody, so mainly it was about seeing the riders, like Museeuw - one of my first memories I have on the cobbles is of Museeuw beating these guys.
Each year I got better and in the juniors I was competing with a young Philippe Gilbert in some races.
But I didn’t win so much. I only started winning after university. After my junior years my parents insisted I went to university. I did four years in Gent, I got a degree and after that I got one year of freedom to try to maximise what I could in cycling. I studied sports science and I got the degree in 2005. During my studies I was living in Gent, renting a studio apartment like all students do.
In the summer I graduated and I became Belgian champion in the under 23s
and because of that I got a place in the second division team of Quick Step. And then after a very good year I rode a lot of nice races internationally [he won the Tour Bretagne Cycliste and a stage at Tour des Pyrénées], and therefore got a spot in the Lotto team for 2007. I was just improving and having nice results and from one level to getting better, a professional team offered me a contract.
Like everybody you hope to compete in the big races and get some nice results, and that’s what you work for.
I wanted to make the Tour of Flanders because I live there; it was the reason I joined the team. It was all I was dreaming of winning, the nice cobbled classics then later on in my career I [found] I was suited more to the hilly classics: Liège, Amstel, Flèche.
I was quite good, but no one expected I was going to win so then I just started helping the rider I had in front of me in the team.
In Lotto I just had to set the pace to make the day finish in a bunch sprint, and then later on I had Tom Boonen sometimes as the leader, and then Gilbert, and now Alaphilippe.
When I joined Quick Step the team was built around Tom Boonen.
He won a lot of races but now everywhere we go we can win, except for maybe grand tour GCs. Other than that, everywhere we go we can win. Back in the day it was more focus on the cobbled classics.
Everybody should experience winning some races.
I went to IAM Cycling in 2015 and 2016 and I got a lot of confidence from my sports directors there. I had no leaders and no riders to work for so now and then I could try for myself, try to get some results, it was really nice.
I still live in Kwaremont but I’m never there during the classics.
I normally do Pays Basque, which means I leave Flanders on the Friday and Saturday. I see the villages and the tents but mostly when the races pass I’m not there. My father has six brothers and sisters and all of them live in Kwaremont so [the family] just stayed where they always lived.
Every year when when the Tour of Flanders passed I’d cheer Johan Museuuw.
That’s one of my first special memories I have of cycling. Before they would just pass one time but now Kwaremont becomes almost a festival, because it passes so many times, the fans stay there for one month. It’s completely different now, but we only have the benefit of it I would say. I think it’s strange more for my supporters than myself to not race Flanders. For me, it’s okay - I like to race other races but my supporters would like to see me on the cobbles.
I’m 36 now. What keeps me going is...
the team atmosphere, the winning atmosphere, the fight. That’s it.