OFFICIAL | No more guessing, Mathieu van der Poel will start 2025-2026 cyclocross season in just nine days

This Friday morning, Alpecin-Deceuninck has hosted an event in Antwerp with its team management. Yesterday, the team has said goodbye to Deceuninck as a sponsor, and has welcomed Premier Tech who will be a title sponsor from next season onwards. And alongside this came the confirmation of Mathieu van der Poel's cyclocross season start on the 14th of December.

Initially, the Belgian team announced his schedule with the Namur World Cup on the 14th as a provisional race, not a confirmation. Whilst it was always going to be likely, the brutal cross and the timing (a week before he begins a consecutive string of races) could've meant he would take another week to train and prepare for his off-road campaign.

However, that is not going to be the case. "Good news, confirmed. Mathieu van der Poel feels race-ready enough to kick off his cyclocross season next Sunday at the UCI Cyclocross World Cup in Namur," the team shared on social media this afternoon. "The question mark is gone. The World Champion is back in nine days Fans, get ready! Namur is coming".

Namur is coming and so is the rainbow jersey, who perhaps faces the most important winter of his career. In February, on the 1st day of the month in Hulst, Netherlands, van der Poel can make history by beating the record for world titles in cyclocross. If he wins the jersey for an eighth time (and fourth consecutive), he would beat the record that Erick de Vlaeminck set in 1973, and has lasted for over 50 years.

Van der Poel is also most likely going to be the main favourite to take the victory, baring disaster. Over the past seasons he has been virtually untouchable in every race he participates in, and last winter he was not defeated on a single occasion. He became World Champion ahead of Wout van Aert in Lièvin, whilst this winter the Belgian is also only going to make the decision on his participation later in the winter.