Lars van der Haar, the reigning European cyclo-cross champion, likes to plan, be it the best line in a race or his travel schedule. He began his 11th elite season in September and his first weeks as a father, his wife recently delivering a daughter to their family. So this year a set schedule was a new priority to balance travel, competitions and family.
He travelled as planned to the United States to begin his UCI Cyclo-cross World Cup campaign at the headquarters of his team, Baloise Trek Lions, in Wisconsin. However, without three World Cups in the US for the first time in several years – the Iowa event is no longer on the schedule – Van der Haar had to make a tough decision to forego the Fayetteville races, a World Cup and a C1, and head home early.
“So I’ve already just become a father and I was already going into America a little bit tired. And then I knew that the jet lag from Chicago [after racing in Waterloo] back would be less rough than coming back from Fayetteville because of the double flight. And because I didn’t already have to go straight into Tabor and then two weeks later it’s Europeans, I thought, I think it’s gonna be a little bit smarter to go home earlier, and the team gave me that opportunity to do that,” Van der Haar explained to Cyclingnews.
“So that’s why I made that decision to then try and maybe win in Tabor and then be better in the end of the season.”
The Dutch champion led from the holeshot to the finish of the C1 contest Friday held on the property of the Trek Bicycles headquarters in Waterloo, Wisconsin to take the win. In between, he fended off challenges from many of the Belgian, Swiss, French and US contingency in the US who will line up at the opening World Cup race Sunday.
“I’m not doing next week [Fayetteville World Cup]. I’m going home already on Monday, so I didn’t want to leave my wife any longer alone,” Van der Haar told Cyclingnews. “The jet lag coming back from Fayetteville is a lot harder than from Chicago.”
The travel from northwest Arkansas to the Netherlands involves a change of planes, typically in Atlanta or Chicago. In addition, a team representative said the smaller jets that depart from the airport in Fayetteville are not big enough to transport all the equipment, so bikes and gear are moved by truck to a larger airport for the flight across the Atlantic. Any non-stop flight from a major hub like Chicago, two hours away from Waterloo, Wisconsin, eliminates many headaches.
Van der Haar said he would like…
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