Drama Brewing at Red Bull With Remco Evenepoel Not Happy With Lipowitz

Remco Evenepoel finished fourth on the first real mountain stage of the Tour de France, but his sharpest attack came after the finish line.

In emotional comments to Belgian media, Evenepoel publicly criticized Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe teammate Florian Lipowitz.

Evenepoel said his fellow GC leader refused to help him chase Jonas Vingegaard in the closing kilometers after Tadej Pogačar’s decisive attack.

“I had asked for a leadout and I didn’t get it,” Evenepoel told Sporza.

“Yes, I was angry and rightly so. In the Volta a Catalunya I rode 30 kilometers at the front for him. I asked to do one kilometer of work and he didn’t. That made me angry and that will have to be properly discussed tonight.”

The comments provided the first public hint of tension that could be brewing inside cycling’s only Tour team built around two protected leaders.

Red Bull came to the Tour with a “let-the-road-decide” tactic, and Thursday’s summit finish revealed how that will look.

There was no immediate reaction Thursday from Lipowitz or Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe.

Dropped on Tourmalet, chasing downhill

The frustration came pouring out after Pogačar detonated the race on the Tourmalet.

Lipowitz dropped Evenepoel on the HC climb, but the double Olympic champion used his descending skills to rejoin a chase group that included Lipowitz, Isaac del Toro, Juan Ayuso, Paul Seixas, and others.

With Pogačar gone, Vingegaard was still up the road alone, but the group never cooperated enough to reel in the Dane.

“I understand that Del Toro and Sepp Kuss don’t work, but Lidl-Trek was there in pairs and they didn’t want to work right away,” Evenepoel said. “I thought, what do you have to lose? If we work together, we might get to Jonas.”

Evenepoel said he was still satisfied with how he managed the Tourmalet, a climb that’s caused him trouble in the past.

“It was pretty good. I did what I could do,” he told Sporza.

“Anyway, I didn’t plan to go over my limit at the end of the Tourmalet, because there was still a long descent ahead.

“UAE went extremely fast. We rode pretty fast ourselves, but they went extremely fast.”

Evenepoel survives first mountain test

Evenepoel recovered much of the lost ground on the twisting, long descent across the heart of the Pyrénées.

“I knew that with my descending skills I could still return to the group in front of me,” he said. “My tactic in the end was that I don’t completely go over the limit uphill and go down quickly.”

Evenepoel remains fourth overall and insisted his Tour is far from over.

It’s a positive sign for the Belgian superstar, who lost 4kg before the race and was sequestered at altitude camps without racing for more than two months before the Tour.

“Yes, there is still a lot possible, but Jonas is also strong. We must not forget that,” Evenepoel said.

With Pogačar all but riding away with the GC, some inside-the-bus intrigue might help keep this Tour interesting.