Nick Nuyens had a spring to forget and he was happy to start a vacation after the Grand Prix Frankfurt, having suffered a lot of bad luck in the races that he really was targeting for some better results. He told Velonation how he wants to save his season.
Nuyens shrugged his shoulders when asked about his spring. "From one race to another I had bad luck. Every year is different and this is not a good year for me, apparently," he said.
Nuyens needed three tire changes in the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, for example, and after a few crashes was even in doubt for his season highlight, the Ronde van Vlaanderen. He was able to ride in Flanders in the end, but could not finish the race.
He was relieved that the first part of the season was coming to a close. He never had raced in Frankfurt before, but heard it was nice. "This is the last race of my spring campaign, then I am taking a break."
Afterwards, he goes with renewed ambitions to save his season. "I am working towards the National Championships, at the end of June. It is a really nice parcours in Leuven [just east of Brussels -ed] that suits me very well. And the Belgian National Jersey is very nice, so why not?"
He is not clear yet about his second part of the season. "I don't exactly know my program, we haven't discussed it yet with the team. I may do the Vuelta but if not, I'll do some one-day races and then normally the World Championships." The Tour de France, which he raced once so far, is not on his agenda.
Nuyens was looking strong in some of the spring races and his lack of results is not for a bad preparation. "I had a very good winter. I was in Spain a lot for training." This allowed him to get the miles in that he was unable to do in snowy Belgium. "I was in Benidorm, which is a good area to train. You can go into the mountains easily and there is always good weather there," the Belgian said.
"In total I was there more or less a month and I had two days of rain." Which was quite a stark contrast to when his racing season finally got underway. "This year, everywhere I come there is rain," he said. This sort of sums up his first part of the season.