Ahead of his highly-anticipated return to the cyclocross field, Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) believes he’s ready to fight immediately for victories, but he has singled out Thibau Nys (Trek-Baloise Lions) as the rider to watch.
Van der Poel will kick off his 2025-26 CX season this Sunday at the UCI World Cup round in Namur, before he embarks on a 13-race programme that builds up to the World Championships in Hulst.
There, at home in the Netherlands, he will take aim at a record eighth cyclocross world title, having matched the previous record of seven held by Eric De Vlaeminck in Liévin last season.
The world champion confirmed that he’d only trained twice on his cyclocross bike so far – a new silver machine presented by Canyon on Thursday – but it’s a tried and tested plan: “That’s not much, but it was no different last year, and in the end, it turned out to be enough. Hopefully, it will be enough this time too.”
Van der Poel conceded how he hasn’t been following the season overly closely, but he’s well aware of who’s been doing well – Nys has won his past three races and the opening two rounds of the World Cup.
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at CyclingNews RSS Feed…