‘My Peak Level Must Become My Base’: Evenepoel Lays Out His Plan to Beat Pogačar

Remco Evenepoel puts it all out there in a new long-form video interview with Specialized.

After a blockbuster first year with Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe, the Belgian star rates his season (“eight out of 10”), shares his take on the 2027 Tour de France route (he digs it), and offers intriguing insights into how his training has changed.

Released Thursday, the “Remco Evenepoel: Pursuit of Perfect” YouTube show is the latest in a flurry of off-season “rider does content” releases.

Tadej Pogačar got the red carpet treatment in not one, but two, feature documentaries, and Sepp Kuss broke YouTube with his “day in the life” video.

Now it’s Remco’s turn.

As a Specialized production, the conversation leans heavily on the rider’s “love” of his Tarmac and Shiv, and how he’s refining his position for 2027.

However, Evenepoel also speaks for the first time on the hottest topic of the past month: the 2027 Tour de France route.

Evenepoel: ‘What is now my very good must become the standard’

The course for next year’s Tour de France has been labeled “anti-Pogačar” and “pro-Remco.”

Evenepoel is, of course, delighted with a parcours that offers the most time trialing in 15 years.

The four-time TT world champion can build a buffer in 71km against the clock that will buy him breathing room in the mountains.

“I’m very happy. If you see the most amount of TTs since 2012, that’s pretty good,” Evenepoel says in the video. “I would love it [the TTs] to be even a bit longer, but I’m very happy with what we’ve got.”

Evenepoel finished a distant second to Pogačar at the 2026 Tour de France.

However, next year offers him a slim chance to go one step better.

Evenepoel tells podcast host Ben Edwards that he and his entourage will spend winter figuring out how he can maximize his strengths for next summer’s showdown with Pog.

“I need to be able to bring my one-day TT performance into the grand tours,” Evenepoel says.

“In the world championships, I put a minute into [Filippo] Ganna, and at the Chrono des Nations, I put two minutes into [Jay] Vine. If I can bring those performances into the grand tours, I’d gain even more.

“What is now my ‘very good’ must now become the standard,” he continues. “Over winter we’ll have to see how and when, and why we can or can’t do that. I’m sure with all the knowledge the team and my little crew around me have, and with my own experience, that we can find that.”

Evenepoel adds that he hopes to devise an energy management plan so that he can peak for his key stages of the Tour and play defense elsewhere.

“We need to make a strategy to come into those TTs fresh and really use them to see what time they will bring,” he says.

Vingegaard’s former coach brings a new training philosophy

Will it work?

Maybe Evenepoel’s new training framework will help.

In the video, the 26-year-old discusses how Tim Heemskerk – the former coach of Jonas Vingegaard – revolutionized his approach to training.

The Dutch staffer joined Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe mid-season and brought a new data-driven approach to workouts.

“Tim really wanted all sorts of inside information – sleeping metrics, weight, HRV, all that stuff. He wanted it every single day,” Evenepoel says.

“He wanted it first thing in the morning so he could see how the values were overnight. Then he could adapt something [for the coming workout] if necessary,” Evenepoel says. “That was never a way I’ve been thinking.”

The video runs to almost an hour in length, but it’s well worth a watch. What else are you going to do now there’s no road racing to binge on?

Watch the full show on Specialized’s YouTube channel.