"Van der Poel wasn't even given a fine" - Latvian federation files complain after dangerous riding at World Championships

The World Championships have finished three days ago but the stories are not yet over. Mathieu van der Poel took the bronze medal on Sunday ahead of Latvia's Toms Skujins. Now, the Latvian Cycling Federation has issued a complaint against the Dutchman over a dangerous maneuver during the race that has in the past earned disqualifications to riders.

"We wish to draw your attention to a potentially dangerous race situation and the fact that the video of this moment is circulating on social media showing a very dangerous move by Mathieu van der Poel during the Elite Men World Championship in Zurich 2024, as the Dutch rider rode on a walkway with 58.4 km to go," the statement read. This was the moment van der Poel rode to the sidewalk of the road briefly to overtake and attack a group of riders; narrowly missing out on some spectators.

"According to the rules (UCI Cycling Regulations 2.12.007: Race Incidents Relating to Road Events Rule 7.6), a rider jumping onto a walkway and endangering the public or other riders must be disqualified immediately. The issue isn't merely that he was riding on the pavement, which would typically result in a fine of 200 to 1000 CHF; in this case, van der Poel wasn't even given a fine. The real problem is that he endangered spectators, a violation that has consistently been penalized with disqualification this year, as seen with Marlen Reusser at the 2024 Gent-Wevelgem and Luke Rowe at the 2018 Ronde van Vlaanderen."

Obviously, this is a statement that was issued with the underlying goal that if the Dutchman were to be disqualified, it would end up promoting Lidl-Trek's Skujins to third place in the race which would be a massive achievement for the small eastern European nation. However, this is unlikely to have any effect taking into consideration that no action was taken at the time, and days have since passed.

"Van der Poel almost rode into a spectator while overtaking three riders on a footpath with no other particular reason, as he was not avoiding a crash. After the race, representative of the Latvian Federation tried to discuss this race situation with UCI commissaires. One of the race commissaires stated that all of the commissaires had seen the situation, deemed it not dangerous and something to be penalized," Sandis Akis, president of the federation, continued.

"The Latvian representative insisted that the rules apply to everyone, but the commissaire argued that it wouldn't be good for the sport, interpreting the rules as they saw fit. The Latvian representative was subsequently sent away. It seems that some are more equal than others, especially when it comes to unpopular decisions to be made."

"As a relatively small Federation, we are deeply concerned about this decision. If van der Poel had crashed into a spectator on the road, would that have been good or bad for our sport? We urge the UCI to apply its rules consistently to ensure the safety and integrity of cycling and not to leave this kind of potential accident without response, just because it would be so-called damage of reputation. We, as a part of the cycling world, expect the UCI to publicly explain the decision of commissaries to avoid similar situations, as paying no attention to this situation creates a ground for greater risk to racing in the future which is something no one wants," they concluded.