(photo credit: tomphotocycling)
Mathieu van der Poel roared to victory in Round #7 of the UCI World Cup Cyclo-Cross in Hulst, Netherlands on Sunday. Rounding out the podium was Laurens Sweeck in 2nd spot and Eli Iserbyt in 3rd.
How It Happened
Van der Poel started the race from the 4th row, but he quickly moved up and within minutes was going head-to-head with Lars van der Haar, Laurens Sweeck, and Tom Pidcock.
By the beginning of lap 2, the lead group was six riders: Iserbyt, van der Haar, van der Poel, Vanthourenhout, Sweeck, and Pidcock. This group was reduced to five when Vanthourenhout slipped at the bottom of a descent halfway through the lap and lost contact.
In lap 3, Pidcock and Sweeck forced a gap on the lead group and put their closest rival, van der Poel, behind them by 17 seconds. This gap held until the end of lap 3 and the lead group reformed with Pidcock leading Sweeck, van der Poel, Iserbyt, and van der Haar.
As lap 4 got underway, Sweeck and van der Poel held the lead with Pidcock a few seconds back. Pidcock eventually closed the gap and retook the lead position until he got caught up in his pedals at the top of short climb. Van der Poel took advantage of the situation and the lead passed back to him.
At 5 laps to go, van der Poel had a 5 second advantage on Pidcock and 8 seconds on Sweeck. By the end of lap 5, van der Poel had doubled the gap to Pidcock to 10 seconds.
By lap 6, van der Poel had grown his lead to 18 seconds over Pidcock before he fell against a fence and lost his chain on the steep run-up section. Van der Poel remounted, but lost time, and his lead was cut to 10 seconds. Throughout lap 6, Pidcock and van der Poel were evenly matched and the gap held steady at 10 seconds.
By the start of the bell lap (7), van der Poel had gained a few seconds and his lead had increased to 12 seconds over Pidcock, and 33 seconds over Sweeck. But Pidcock still looked strong and it appeared that there would be a final lap duel between the two. Unfortunately, for Pidcock, bad luck struck and he caught a rut at the bottom of a descent and folded his rim and went tumbling. Although he was up in no time and running with his bike, he soon realized he wasn’t anywhere near a pit and that it was pointless to continue, and he abandoned the race.
With no threat of Pidcock behind him, Van der Poel finished out the final lap easily and had plenty of time to celebrate his victory. Behind him, Sweeck and Iserbyt followed in 2nd and 3rd place.
Race Insights
While it’s doubtful whether Pidcock could have caught van der Poel, it’s unfortunate that he didn’t have the opportunity to find out, and that the fans didn’t have the opportunity to see a battle between him and van der Poel.
Riders appeared more at ease with the conditions in Hulst than the previous Sunday in the slick conditions in Overrijse. While Hulst had more challenging descents and steep run-ups, it didn’t have the kinds of slick straightaways that characterized the Overrijse course.
Mathieu van der Poel appeared fit and ready to race, even if he was a bit rusty with his technique in certain sections of the course. It’s expected that he will only get better over time and that his form is still on an upward trajectory. Additionally, unlike the other riders who have been competing since October, van der Poel, along with Pidcock and van Aert, will have the benefit of being fresh in the second half of the World Cup series.
With the race series now halfway over, Laurens Sweeck has taken over the leader’s jersey from Eli Iserbyt and now leads Iserbyt by 4 points, followed by Michael Vanthourenhout in third.
The entry of super ‘cross riders Tom Pidcock and Mathieu van der Poel has raised the overall level of the World Cup series and will play a role in how the series leaders, Sweeck, Iserbyt, Vanthourenhourt, and van der Haar, will race the second half of the series. With the entry of Wout van Aert soon, we can expect this level of competition to rise again when the Big 3 meet in the coming weeks.
