Ronhaar makes promise now that Nys and Van der Haar have done enough: "Bad weather is coming..."

"He is right about that, although I felt in Merksplas that it is improving. I missed my pedal at the start today and then couldn't change gears, so I turned into the first corner last. However, I could move reasonably well and ended up riding top ten, so I'm quite satisfied."

"Well, that foundation is there. We also gambled a bit at the beginning of the season by only training on the basics. Therefore, I missed the intensity of going deep in the race's first twenty to thirty minutes. Since last week, we started training more cyclo-cross, and I noticed that it is already paying off. I think I can finally go deep again; I'll compete for the podium in two weeks!"

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"Exactly, that's why, at the beginning of the season, we did a lot of work on the basics. We must keep doing that; the focus must be on the content. But we have to add incentives to that. Suppose I keep doing that and competing simultaneously toward the muddy and slower Christmas period. In that case, I will get increasingly up front and compete for the top five in a few weeks because the podium will be very difficult. But for now, I'm happy with the top ten. It looks a little better every week."

"Yes, I think so. If I had been the leader of this team, there would have been a lot of pressure on me. Then, you may start doing too much and expecting too much from yourself. Now we have two guys who can ride for results, so I can quietly grow into good form."

"Yes. The X2O classification is completely gone, though. That's a shame because that was also a bit of a goal. Now, we are focusing on the World Cup. Bad weather is coming, so I'm looking forward to that. I also go to cyclo-cross with more motivation, which was slightly less in the first weekends."

Bram van der Ploeg (Twitter: @BvdPloegg | email: [email protected])