"Why is he riding with him?": Sean Kelly frustrated by Van der Poel's opponent handing over Omloop victory on a silver plate

After the chaos and an eventual sprint victory of Soren Waerenskjold at last year's Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, this situation was quite different before the 2026 edition. The presence of Mathieu van der Poel at the race's 81st edition was a clear signal to opponents that, if you want to win, you have to defeat this man. And about that bunch finish? That was almost never going to repeat with Van der Poel at the start.

While any rider not wearing the Alpecin - Premier Tech jersey on Saturday morning was trembling in fear of the moment Van der Poel chooses to unleash his full power, a three-time podium finsher in the '80s, Sean Kelly already felt a slight loss of interest... as if the race had been over before it even begun.

"When he announced on Thursday that he was riding, I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed, as I'm sure many of the riders did," the Irish cycling legend wrote in his Cyclingnews column.

The traditionally chaotic and open race therefore quickly turned into a race of waiting for inevitable - the moment Van der Poel blows up the race. Of course, there was the odd chance that the Dutchman might've not arrive in his prime shape just one month since his cyclocross world title, but those hopes quickly disappeared as Van der Poel triumphed without hesitation. "As it turned out, he made it look so, so easy," Kelly noted.

Kelly doesn't forget to praise the Dutchman, however he admits to begin to feel a little bit "bored" by the dominance of Van der Poel (and Tadej Pogacar) who seem to almost never miss out on a victory. "Make no mistake, Van der Poel is still impressive to watch. He's phenomenal, not just physically but also technically," explains the nine-time Monuments winner.

His technical finesse was demonstrated during the race's decisive moment. As Rick Pluimers, riding just at the head of the peloton at that time, crashed on Molenberg, Van der Poel was able to evade the compatriot on the ground in a split second, allowing himself to counter Florian Vermeersch's move which turned out to have been the winning one later on.

"He just moved calmly, put his foot out, narrowly avoided it, and started again," Kelly describes the incident. According to the Irishman, this is the ultimate proof of a rider of Van der Poel's bike-handling supremacy. "The ability to keep such a cool head is a huge achievement."

Even though it soon became clear Van der Poel's group would fight it out for a victory among its three strongest members, both Florian Vermeersch and Tim van Dijke were not without a chance to upset the Dutchman, just like Kasper Asgreen managed to at the 2021 Tour of Flanders. And while Van Dijke played the patient game for the most part, his Belgian opponent kept relaying with Van der Poel - even though it seemed counter-intuitive.

"I was watching it, wondering, ‘Why is he riding that strongly with him?’ He was too generous, in my eyes," Kelly recalled. "[The sports director] can give you that word in your ear to say okay, just take it easy, if you’re doing turns just do a very short turn, leave Mathieu to do the bulk of the work, maybe skip a turn here and there, and see if you can get over the Muur with him."

There's no doubt the UAE teammate of Tadej Pogacar had great legs of his own on Saturday, but he already gave up the moment Van der Poel closed his acceleration on Molenberg, it seems. Kelly feels like that was a shame: "If you do manage to get over the Muur with Van der Poel, you go into the final with him, and then you never know what might happen."