Greg Van Avermaat hosted a mini training camp for the CCC team this week, inviting five riders to his villa in the Walloon Ardennes for a mix of road and mountain biking.

The Olympic champion lives in East Flanders but has a second home in Stoumont, south of Liège. This week, fellow CCC Belgians Serge Pauwels, Guillaume van Kerbsburg, Nathan van Hoydonck, and Gijs van Hocke arrived, along with Swiss classic domestique Michael Scheer.

According to Sporza (opens in new tab), "It had been a long time since we had seen each other," Van Avermaat said.

"I thought it would be nice to invite the other Belgians on the team and Michael to train hard for a few days here. It's a small initiative, but good for the group spirit. There were six of us in total and we all stayed at my place. It was fun."

The group of six trained for three days, covering 146 km and 2,876 m elevation gain on Monday and 166 km and 3,180 m elevation gain on Tuesday. On Wednesday, they swapped their race bikes for mountain bikes and rode a 95 km route that included 2,489 m elevation gain.

"Tough ride with lots of altimeter. I do that a lot, but the other riders seemed to feel it," Van Avermaat said. 'It's fun and a nice change of training. It doesn't feel like training."

The Belgian contingent left Wednesday evening, but Schaal stayed behind and the two will leave on Sunday. On Thursday, they will take a break from riding to enjoy kayaking, and on Friday they will ride 163 km, or 2,336 meters.

"It was small," Van Avermaat said, "with no team chef, no soignée, no mechanic.

"We planned, prepared breakfast, made a little pasta for lunch, and ate at a restaurant in the evening. It was great to see everyone again and train together.

Juan Avermate's training will be further enhanced next month with a high-altitude training camp in Livigno from July 14 to 30. 19]

Juan Avermate will ride the Tour de France from August 29 to September 20, and will take on the He will take on the classics in October.