2023-08-07 00:08:45
The bloody elbow, the shorts and the jersey torn, Mathieu Van der Poel can exult and take his head in his hands. A treble Milan-San-Remo, Paris-Roubaix, World Championships in the same year… Nobody had done it before in the history of cycling. Already a five-time cyclo-cross world champion (2015, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2023), the 28-year-old Dutchman won his first Worlds on the road. Despite a fall in the final when he left alone 22 km from the finish, he was the strongest. Thirty-eight years after the coronation of Joop Zoetemelk, the Netherlands return to the world title.
“It was one of the most objective I had left, recognizes Mathieu Van der Poel. .Winning today is exceptional. I won almost everything I wanted to win in my career, it’s my greatest success on the road. I knew it was necessary to attack at the most difficult moment, I pushed the others to the limit. I saw that no one was going to follow me when I attacked. And then I fell! For a moment, yes, I thought it was over. I found myself on the ground, I was pissed at myself. It was very slippery, I didn’t feel like I was making a mistake. But I started again, I wouldn’t say it was more fun to win like that but it adds a little spice! For me it’s revenge on what happened last year at the Worlds, I’m going to savor it, that’s for sure. »
With this tortuous circuit laid out in the streets of Glasgow, these World Championships were already shaping up to be special. 192 km from the finish, the race was neutralized after being interrupted by four demonstrators. The riders were stopped for 55 minutes before setting off again without forgetting to give back to the nine elements of the traditional morning breakaway their lead (more than 6 minutes) acquired before the interruption.
Then it got a lot hectic. We saw several favorites, Alberto Bettiol, Remco Evenepoel, Tadej Pogacar, Mathieu Van Der Poel, attack. For Christophe Laporte, the trump card of the French team, the race stopped 105 km from the finish after a mechanical problem. Distanced, the runner from Jumbo-Visma, silver medalist last year in Australia, could not return. Benoît Cosnefroy and Valentin Madouas, the last two Frenchmen to appear in the main group of favorites, respectively dropped 67 km and 54 km from the finish.
A nice number by Alberto Bettiol
In the rain, Alberto Bettiol, the only Italian in the race for victory after the fall of Matteo Trentin, launched an attack 54 km from the finish. The EF Education-EasyPost rider (29) had a maximum lead of 41 seconds 42 km from the finish over a quartet of Mathieu van der Poel- Wout van Aert- Tadej Pogacar- Mads Pedersen. Four of the five big favorites at the start this morning… The 5th, Remco Evenepoel, who had tried hard to attack but who seemed embarrassed on this technical circuit, was distanced 45 km from the finish. The defending champion will not achieve the double.
Despite a good number, Bettiol was joined 22 km from the finish by the quartet of pursuers. In the bump, Van der Poel places a violent start in the wake of a puncher. The Dutchman flies through the streets of Glasgow, quickly taking a lead of more than 30 seconds. Aerial, it is impressive but it slips in a bend 17 km from the finish. If he leaves immediately, his right shoe is broken. He also has a bloody elbow, torn shirt and shorts.
The French not invited to the party
But this incident did not disturb him. He even widened the gap on Van Aert, Pogacar and Pedersen, reduced to fighting for the two podium places. If we had not seen him much during the last Tour de France, apart from in a role of pilot fish for his sprinter Jasper Philipsen at Alpecin-Deceuninck, he had prepared these Worlds well. Mathieu Van der Poel finished 1′38′ ahead of Van Aert and Pogacar. A royal catwalk.
On the Blues side, the first to arrive is Valentin Madouas, the French champion, who finished 15th at 7′53′ ‘from the grandson of Raymond Poulidor. A bitter failure for the French team which remained on three podiums during the last three editions.
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