Lotto are set to return to the WorldTour for the 2026 season but the Belgian ProTeam aren’t taking anything for granted despite having accumulated a healthy UCI points total during the current ranking period. They hope to win big in May after opting out of the Giro d’Italia, with team leader and world-class sprinter Arnaud De Lie returning to racing in Germany.
As of last week, the team lay 10th overall in the 2023-25 rankings on 28,705 points, well clear of the 18th and final WorldTour slot, currently occupied by Picnic-PostNL on 21,242 points.
Speaking to WielerFlits, Lotto sports manager Kurt Van De Wouwer said that, while his team are looking “safe” in the battle for the WorldTour, they’re looking to keep up the momentum.
“There is certainly no reason to worry yet. We are still quite safe in terms of points. But that does not mean that everything we can get is of great value. We better keep a bit of a buffer,” Van De Wouwer said.
“During the Giro, and also in June, we will ride a nice programme. The intention is to grab something here and there.
“We lost a few important riders during the winter transfer period,” he added, referring to the likes of Maxim Van Gils, Victor Campenaerts, and Florian Vermeersch moving elsewhere.
“We are all sober enough to realise that we should not expect miracles. The riders we still have – that’s a team with which you can go to war in principle. But then there should be no setbacks, everything has to go a little bit right.”
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Lotto has only won twice in 2025 so far, taking a stage apiece at the Etoile des Bessèges and Tour of Turkey, having weathered an injury storm during the spring.
“We had a lot of injuries during the spring,” Van De Wouwer said.
“Lars Craps and Liam Slock had knee surgery, Jenno Berckmoes was sick first and then fell in the Tour of Flanders and Arnaud De Lie was also not at his best due to circumstances. Those surgeries, falls, and illnesses are things that you just have to endure.
“You can then make an evaluation that things are, and have been, less successful in the spring, but then you quickly come to the facts that there have been many setbacks.”
New signing, 36-year-old sprinter Elia Viviani, has contributed with his victory in Turkey.
Van De Wouwer praised the Italian for retaining the hunger to succeed when he could have retired, while also pointing out the setbacks other Lotto riders have dealt with in recent months.
“Given his age, he could just as well have stopped racing,” Van De Wouwer said about Viviani.
“He has now secured that victory, but it is not the intention for it to stop there. The hunger for more is great, and it was a relief that he was able to score so quickly.”
Viviani will ride today’s Classique Dunkerque one-day race and this week’s 4 Jours de Dunkerque stage race.
Arnaud De Lie is back in the saddle for Lotto at the Rund um Köln (Image credit: Getty Images)
De Lie, the team’s star rider, is on track to return soon, with Van De Wouwer revealing that the 23-year-old will be back in the peloton at the Rund um Köln on May 18 following a spring illness.
“He is doing better now,” Van De Wouwer said.
“But to be honest, we don’t want to communicate too much about that, certainly not to put too much pressure on him. That wouldn’t be fair, when he has been out for so long.”
More riders will be making their returns from various injuries, too, giving the team a boost heading into the summer months.
“We are finally starting to recover many of those injured riders,” Van De Wouwer said. “Craps and Slock could also be back by the end of June. The intention is for Arnaud to resume in Cologne and Jenno Berckmoes to do the same in the Four Days of Dunkirk.
“I have the impression the team is starting to run at full speed again.”
