Stuyven joined UCI WorldTeamTrek Factory Racing in 2014 at the age of 22. During this season, he rode in his first grand tour, the Vuelta a España. In this race, he earned fourth place in three stages and finished ninth in the points classification.[5]
2015
2015 brought Stuyven his biggest victory yet, when he won stage 8 of the Vuelta a España in a reduced bunch sprint. Stuyven had been involved in a crash earlier in the stage and he was forced to withdraw from the race after the stage with a broken scaphoid.[6]
In 2016, he won the Belgian one-day race Kuurne–Brussels–Kuurne by breaking away solo for the last 17 kilometres (11 miles) of the race.[7] Stuyven also earned a fifth place at the E3 Harelbeke. He was named in the start list for the Tour de France[8] where he held the polka-dot jersey as leader of the mountains classification for two days.
2017
Stuyven was part of the 5 man leading group at Paris–Roubaix, and finished fourth in the sprint finish behind Greg Van Avermaet of BMC Racing Team.[9] He rode in the Giro d'Italia.[10] In stage six, Stuyven finished second behind Silvan Dillier of BMC Racing Team after the pair had been part of a five-man breakaway that rode clear of the peloton for almost all of the 217-kilometre (135-mile) stage.[11] Stuyven finished the race in 98th place overall, and was second in the points classification behind Fernando Gaviria of Quick-Step Floors.
On 20 March, Stuyven won Milan-San Remo for his first Monument victory. With three kilometers left, he attacked at the bottom of the descent of the Poggio, the last climb in the race. Many of the main pre-race favorites in the lead group were hesitant to chase him down, though Søren Kragh Andersen managed to bridge across to Stuyven in the final kilometer. With the group closing down the duo, Stuyven launched out of Kragh Andersen's slipstream in the last 200 meters. Though he was on his limit, he held on for the win on the line just ahead of the chasing group, led home by Caleb Ewan ahead of defending champion Wout van Aert.[19][20]
Personal life
Stuyven studied at the Sint-Pieterscollege in Leuven. Outside of cycling, he and his uncle Ivan, an experienced chocolatier, run a small chocolate boutique in Betekom named Chocolade Atelier Stuyven that opened in 2016 and often produces many cycling-themed pieces.[21]
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