cycling
Arnaud De Lie (Lotto-Dstny) knows the reason why he suddenly lost his fitness and was nowhere last weekend: Lyme disease is the culprit.
Blood tests revealed this on Wednesday. Lyme disease is caused by a tick bite from a tick infected with a bacterium (Borrelia burgdorferi). The infectious disease must be treated with antibiotic treatment for at least ten days. The positive of the negative is that De Lie and his employer now know why things didn’t go well in the E3 Saxo Classic and Gent-Wevelgem.
New trainer
The 22-year-old De Lie also no longer works with trainer Jeroen Dingemans, on whose advice he held a three-week internship on Teide prior to the Omloop het Nieuwsblad. Ex-rider Gaëtan Bille takes over this role. It is not yet clear how long the ‘Bull of Lescheret’ will remain out of the peloton, but on the other hand there will be the Lotto Famenne Ardenne Classic on April 28. And that is a one-day match at De Lie’s home around the corner. If the Lotto-Dstny leader is ready to compete again by then, this seems ideal as a restart of a season that did not start at all as he had hoped.
