When Michael Vink rolled across the line at the 2024 Tour of Guangxi – the tour of no more for so many riders racing out their contract year or indeed their career – the 32-year-old New Zealander could sense his professional dream slipping away. It would be his last stop on the WorldTour and the reluctant end to a two-year run with UAE Team Emirates.
"There aren't any gifts there," Vink told Escape Collective while pragmatically describing the cold and transactional conclusion to a couldn't-come-at-a-worse-time string of severe illness. It started with COVID-19 that progressed to heart inflammation, followed by a chronic bout of Epstein-Barr virus during the Spring Classics that forced him to lose over five months of racing, his connection with the team, and his grasp on the hope of ever returning.
"You’ve got to be able to perform, no matter the circumstances," he said. "And I was in a place where I couldn’t. It wasn’t my fault, and I could do nothing to change it. I just needed time and space to recover, which I didn’t have."
That period away from racing gave him the chance to step back, reassess everything, and ask himself, "Is this where I want to be?"
“It’s a case of head vs. heart," he said. "My head says it’s 100% virtual racing, and being with MyWhoosh in every way makes more sense than racing on the WorldTour." That answer prompted another question.
"Where do I want to go? What opportunities are there for me now at this stage of my career?"
No one ever handed anything to Vink, who did part-time yeoman's work in bike shops while bouncing between club and Continental teams for over a decade, coaching himself to help balance the budget and stay in the game because the WorldTour was always where he wanted to be. Until now.
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