Like his father, Mathieu first made a name for himself in cyclocross. At the Olympic Games in Tokyo, he is aiming for mountain bike gold.
Mathieu Van Der Poel from Nertherland celebrates after crossing the finish line to win the second stage of the Tour de France cycling race. AP
Mûr-de-Bretagne: After two days on his first Tour de France, Mathieu van der Poel has added a stage win and the yellow jersey of the famous frontrunner to an impressive collection of triumphs on mountain bikes and one-day classics.
Van Poel’s father is Dutch, his mother French and he was born in Belgium.
Dad Adrie won cyclocross and mountain bike titles as well as Tour de France stages and one-day street classics.
Like his father, Mathieu initially acted like his father a name in cyclocross. At the Olympic Games in Tokyo he is aiming for mountain bike gold.
Mathieu followed his older brother David into the teams of Philip Roodhooft, who heads the Belgian Alpecin-Fenix team.
« When I was 18 , I was discovered by Philip Roodhooft, « David, who is 29 and Mathieu is 26, recently told AFP. « They gave me the chance to ride for them. Mathieu came to me two years later. »
The younger van der Poel accumulated a number of cyclocross and junior road racing titles but was after his first major road win , the Dutch Amstel Gold Race in 2019, to the star in the Netherlands.
Van der Poel doesn’t have the raw top speed of the top sprinters, but he has immense power, great for a racing cyclist, and can win big Achieve distance by attacking well before the finish line.
On Sunday he launched his attack on the first of two late climbs of the short but brutal Mur-de-Bretagne.
Walked at the 2019 World Championships in Yorkshire he got into the rain early, but broke and ended almost 11 minutes behind the winner, the Dane Mads Pedersen.
« Sometimes I attack too early, » admitted van der Poel in an interview with Velo Magazine in March 2020 .
Poulidor, always a contender for the Tour de France, exits he never really won, was called “the eternal runner-up”.
On Sunday, van der Poel filled a gap in the family’s résumé when he put on the yellow jersey that his grandfather had never worn in a race.
He spoke of a different destination: Paris-Roubaix is the only one of the five one-day cycling monuments to be cycled in France.
Poulidor won other classics, but despite riding the hell of the north 18 times, he was never better than fifth.
In addition to the Amstel Gold, van der Poel also won the Tour of Flanders, one of two monuments that are driven in Belgium. He has not ridden Paris-Roubaix yet.
« Paris-Roubaix is one of the most beautiful races of the year, I’ve rarely missed it on TV, » said van der Poel, adding that he was the prospect of the famous cobblestone street to ride that was made smooth by the rain.
« That makes the race even more heroic and the ability on the bike becomes the decisive factor. »
Changed date:
June 28, 2021 9:49:36 AM
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Many others were also caught in two mass pile-ups – the first at 45 km, caused by a spectator in the street holding a sign, and the second within 8 km of the finish, where world champion Julian Alaphilippe took the stage victory.
The woman held up a sign that read « Grandma and Grandpa » and looked up the street at the motorcycle cameras of the race, crucially with her back to the racing peloton.
The 108th edition of the Tour de France (TDF) begins on June 26th with 21 strenuous stages in which the 23 teams and over 180 riders will be put to the test. The race starts in Brest, Brittany, and includes two individual time trials, a double-stage challenge on Mont Ventoux, before culminating on July 18 on the Champs Elysees in Paris.
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