From Cow Dung Crisis to Tour de France DNF: This Sprinter Needs a Lucky Break

Arnaud De Lie’s dream of winning on the Champs-Élysées ended in heart-wrenching fashion Monday when he abandoned stage 3 of the Tour de France.

The Belgian climbed into his Lotto-Intermarché team car after a long battle with the time cut during Monday’s grueling stage through the Pyrénées.

It was an ugly end to the Tour de France for De Lie, and his second grand tour DNF in 3 months. The 24-year-old also abandoned the Giro d’Italia on stage 4 in May.

Persistent illness has shrunk De Lie’s calendar of 42 grand tour stages to 7 and raised questions about his team’s selection policies.

“This is of course a huge disappointment,” De Lie told Het Laatste Nieuws on Monday evening. “I have been working towards the Tour for months and I dreamed of competing in the sprint stages.”

The writing seemed to be on the wall before De Lie even started this Tour de France.

He showed up so sick with stomach issues that he was forced to miss the team presentation in Barcelona on Thursday.

He could barely hack the pace in the stage 1 team time trial 48 hours later, and finished dead last on stage 2.

“This stomach infection has severely weakened me,” De Lie said Monday. “I gave everything in the first two stages, but today I simply didn’t have the legs to continue, certainly not in this extreme heat.

“I told Baptiste [Veistroffer, teammate – ed] who stayed with me today to ride on alone,” De Lie continued. “Otherwise he wouldn’t finish within the time limit.”

Lyme disease, cow dung infection, Tour de France abandon

De Lie was once touted as one of the most exciting new sprinters of pro cycling, but has been repeatedly derailed by sickness.

“The Bull of the Ardennes” was diagnosed with Lyme disease in spring 2024 and has been battling persistent stomach complaints ever since.

Many suspected lingering symptoms of the bacterial infection caused De Lie’s spluttering form in this year’s cobblestone classics.

A case of gastroenteritis in May set him back even further.

De Lie was one of many riders who raced the mud-splattered Famenne Ardennes Classic who were later forced to abandon the Giro d’Italia with a stomach infection.

Teams suspected that cow manure on the slick roads of the Famenne sprayed its way across De Lie and many others in the peloton.

Team defends keeping De Lie in race

De Lie’s Tour de France abandon on Monday was a true tear-jerker.

The stocky Belgian was off the back early in the grippy 200km stage and struggling to keep pace with his supporting teammates.

Lotto-Intermarché management eventually told De Lie’s last support man, Veistroffer, to return to the bunch.

The palid sprinter was beyond salvation.

“I rode at the front for more than 100 kilometers with Arnaud on my wheel. He couldn’t take over a single meter,” Veistroffer told Het Laatste Nieuws. “On the climbs, he had to pedal at the same watts as me, and it just wasn’t possble.”

Lotto-Intermarché said Monday that De Lie stepped off on the final climb of the day “to protect his health.”

However, many questioned whether De Lie should even have been selected for the Tour de France, let alone been given a pass to ride that far.

Team management insisted there was nothing in De Lie’s blood markers that suggested he shouldn’t be racing.

“Medically speaking, there was absolutely no reason not to let him start,” team manager Kurt van de Wouwer said Monday.

Pieter Vanspeybrouck – another DS at Lotto – said the intense heat was the final straw that broke the sickness-prone sprinter.

“Minor ailments such as those stomach problems have been plaguing him all year. That’s now combined with the heat. And that has a huge impact on his recovery,” Vanspeybrouck told HLN.

“We have always supported Arnaud. Hats off to how he fought until the end.”

What next for De Lie?

Surely things can only improve for him from here.