Can Egan Bernal return to his former glory? 🇨🇴
The Ineos rider picked up two wins at the Colombian nationals to spark a wave of excitement. We hear from Ineos on their belief in the former Tour winner
Last Thursday Bernal picked up his first win since the 2022 horror crash that almost ended his career, and could have taken his life.
Four days later the Colombian was winning again, this time picking up a national road race title to add to the TT victory he’d already sealed. Two wins in a matter of days; not bad for a rider who hadn’t reached the top step of a podium since the 2021 Giro d’Italia.
The first win sparked a wave of jubilation for a rider who had experienced a traumatic few years. The second, this time after a neat set-up from Ineos teammate Brandon Rivera, saw the cycling world and Bernal’s fans, in particular, reach euphoric levels of joy on social media.
These two Colombian national titles, which will ensure that Bernal wears one of the most iconic kits throughout 2025, were seismic moments in the career of a rider who has spent the last three years focussing on simply finishing races rather than winning them.
The psychological effects stemming from such a depression of potential ambition must have been immense on the young man.
To become a Grand Tour winner and hear your name heralded as the next Eddy Merckx as you ascend the Col d’Iseran in 2019, to being relegated to peloton cannon fodder, would crush the spirits of most of us.