Kristof Vandewalle went into the Worlds time trial aiming at a top 10 but after a fast start, the Belgian faded to end the race in 24th. Feeling the effects of a long season, he is still convinced that he belongs to the 10 best time triallists in the world.

2014 has been kind of a breakthrough season for Kristof Vandewalle. Having always been known as a solid time triallist, the Belgian has now started to turn his potential into big wins. In addition to taking another Belgian championships title, he won the time trials in the Tour of Austria and the WorldTour race Tour de Pologne.

Those performances made him one of the outsiders for today’s Worlds time trial and the Trek rider went into the race aiming for a top 10 result. Things were looking good at the first time check as Vandewalle was 8th fastest among all riders at the 12.23km mark but from there it only got worse. At the next check, he was only 16th, at the third check he had fallen further back to 22nd and finally ended the race in 24th.

“I had the feeling it was not possible to finish in the top 10 and then you lose it a bit in your head. You don’t go 100% anymore,” he told CyclingQuotes after the race. “I started with the rhythm I can normally hold for the whole race but I had the feeling I could not accelerate. I didn’t have the power today and so I lost a little bit of motivation.”

Vandewalle crashed in the Vuelta a Espana and suffered a broken rib that made him a bit cautious for today’s race. Even though he didn’t feel it too much, the injury had made the last few weeks stressful and made Vandewalle mentally tired.

“The last weeks have been hard mentally,” he said. “I was just too tired mentally and physically and I didn’t have the power anymore to fight against this.”

Despite the disappointment, Vandewalle still thinks that he belongs to the best time triallists in the world.

“I don’t know if I will ever be able to beat the guys that are on the podium now,” he said. “I have my place in the top 10 at Worlds if I have my normal level but today it was not a performance on my normal level.”

CyclingQuotes also talked to Vandewalle about his ambitions for shorter stage races. You can read more about that in a later article.