Our feeder team had an excellent start to the season.
William Junior Lecerf enjoyed a strong Tour du Rwanda together with the Soudal Quick-Step Devo Team. After finishing third overall last season, the 21-year-old came close to repeating that result, less than half a minute separating him from the podium after a solid and entertaining week of racing.
The Belgian climber travelled there after a fantastic AlUla Tour in the colors of the World Tour team, where he concluded second on the GC and took home the white jersey. In Rwanda – the host of the 2025 World Championships – William got off an excellent start, powering to victory on the opening stage team time trial together with the squad; three days later, he scored his first pro win and donned the yellow jersey, turning Soudal Quick-Step Devo Team’s outing at the African race into a success.
In the end, after two hard back-to-back stages in the weekend, Lecerf concluded fourth overall, a result that left him with mixed feelings, but at the same time confident for his next appointments: “I wanted to do better than this in the general classification, but we had some bad luck in the second part of the race when some of the guys on the team got sick, which didn’t make things easy. But despite this setback we fought hard and showed the Wolfpack spirit, keen on making the most of this race.”
“At the same time, we can be very proud, because we took two stages and had three different riders wear the yellow jersey, which shows the quality of this team. I am content with the start I had in my first pro season, with some strong results in Saudi and Rwanda, and now I’m really looking forward to my first World Tour race, the Volta a Catalunya, in just a couple of weeks.”
Photo credit: ©Tour du Rwanda
