"Without that crash, he would have stayed in the race" - Adrie van der Poel sees clear reason for Tadej Pogacar beating his son at Tour of Flanders 2025
Cycling
Once again, Mathieu van der Poel and Tadej Pogacar gave an incredibly exciting spectacle for the fans as they went head to head at the 2025 Tour of Flanders on Sunday afternoon. This time, it was the Slovenian world champion who emerged victorious, although according to Adrie van der Poel, father of the Alpecin-Deceuninck leader, there may be a slight taint to that win.
The reason for this belief? The fact that Van der Poel was caught up in a crash at around 126km to go. Although the Dutchman was ultimately able to get back on bike and get back into the mix, following almost all of Pogacar's attacks for the remainder of the race, Adrie believes that one last kick his son needed on the final ascent of the Oude Kwaremont might have been taken in his chase back on.
"Crashes are often underestimated," Van der Poel senior explains in a post-race interview with VTM Nieuws. "You're still hitting the ground at sixty kilometres per hour. I'm convinced that without that crash, he would have stayed in the race. That fall had a big effect."
In the end, Van der Poel had to settle for 3rd place at the line, losing out in the sprint for 2nd behind the runaway Pogacar to Mads Pedersen. "The best riders in the race finish first and third," Adrie van der Poel assesses. "Mads Pedersen, who came second, played it smart, and he’s also definitely faster. The wind also played a major role in how the race unfolded."
Ultimately though, given they can look to the crash as a potential reason for the defeat, camp Van der Poel aren't too dissuaded in their quest for Paris-Roubaix glory next weekend. "It doesn’t really say much about Paris-Roubaix next week, because everyone essentially starts from scratch. But it’s clear that Pogacar is the top favourite. The weather will be good, it will be dry, and he can handle the corners well. Plus, he has a solid team behind him," he concludes. "Riding on cobblestones is just like climbing a mountain to me. When there's nothing left in your legs, you’re not going anywhere."
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Tadej Pogacar wins the 2025 Tour of Flanders in style!
— Mathew Mitchell (@MatMitchell30) April 6, 2025
He joins Merckx as the only multiple Tours de France + multiple Rondes van Vlaanderen winner
Pogacar is the 7th rider to win De Ronde in the WC jersey
One half of the RVV + Roubaix double is in the books#RVV25 #RVVmen pic.twitter.com/DRy8lWMajF
Hold on lets rewind a bit… March 8 2025 Strada Bianche Tadej’s crash hmmm check that out… Torn Jersey, bloodied, changed bike… what happened there?
If I remember well, Pidcock slowed, whether out of respect or strategically or just happy he could ease off a bit, only he knows. Your point?
Pidcock was riding at a hard enough pace until the sector where Pogacar made up something like 20 seconds in something like... 20 seconds. Pidcock was quite a bit ahead, and suddenly he wasn't. At that point, clearly he would get caught, so might as well get caught sooner and work together. That's just good cycling. (I think the point is, plenty of people win even after they've come down in a crash - Van der Poel crashed at the worlds and won, anyway, for example).
Yes, I get that but it wasn’t exactly a good comparison if you ask me, circumstances and competition were very different. Also crashing whilst staying up front is pretty different from crashing and being left behind.
Not just the crash, it was also bad positioning when the first attack of Pogi came.
BS! His son even admitted he was off a few % because he was sick after E3, even taking antibiotics. So he wasn't at Tadeg's level due to that !
Yes, but you have to take into account the order of interviews and the spread of knowledge
Meaning, if dad was asked before he knew of the top secret* illness he wouldn’t have been able to integrate it into his “analysis”. * knowing how he likes talking, I expect it was kept secret even from him so as not to give things away.
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- Hopefully the women won’t be requesting equal prize money as for the men’s race. Even an average week long men’s race is harder than this travesty.
UltimateOpportunist15-04-2025 - So is Pogacar, whose rivals are van der Poel in the monuments and Vingegaard at the Tour, doing the same with his limited calendar of race days?RidesHills15-04-2025
- An interesting description, but I think it misses his motivations. He meets a goal and moves on. Van der Poel does race the Tour, though lately as lead out for Philipsen, after achieving the goal of wearing yellow one day. Same with the Giro, he met his goal and moved on. But yes, lately that sure looks like winning the monuments more than anything else.RidesHills15-04-2025
- Totally agree, if only for the reason that it sends the totally wrong message not to treat it that way, let’s get drunk then we can do stupid things without much punishment, and the drunker the safer. In fact, if alcohol is accepted as a reason for turning to bad behaviour, perhaps representatives of the industry should systematically also be punished financially when there are convictions.Mistermaumau15-04-2025
- I mean the year before cables were external aspect should help narrow down the options as that can only be 1 year if you look at every bike it's the year cables disappeared.HoopoeChai15-04-2025
- If other riders just give up when VDP and Pog turn up to race why bother at all. Sad to hear this attitude and there is the problem riders saying we have lost before the start . We have seen loads of time both riders can be beaten. Less neg and more positive.paultryan200215-04-2025
- I always thought the very best in a sport drove each other and their closest rivals to be better, Tadej and MVDP are driving each other to be better does that mean the rest have given up? To hear many of the pundits you'd think that was the case, they need to drag themselves up to the level to beat MVDP and Tadej because the two of them are not going to waitslappers6615-04-2025
- Must feel like a dream when he's back riding the smooth roads hahaPogboom15-04-2025
- Covid racing was great! You could actually hear the cyclist suffering.
Front24215-04-2025 - I'm pretty sure that it was 2011, when he as on the Saxo Bank team, and the bikes in question are the Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL3 and SL4.
santiagobenites15-04-2025