Adrie van der Poel satisfied with Mathieu van der Poel's current form: "Mathieu just rode as expected"

The Superprestige race in Diegem last night as put together an array of stars and it delivered incredibly amounts of excitement in the night race. Mathieu van der Poel rode to third, after being dropped in the final laps by Tom Pidcock and Wout van Aert, but his father Adrie was not disappointed with the outcome.

Mathieu is building up. He is performing as expected. Whether Mathieu wasted energy because of those early attacks? No, I do not think so. Mathieu just rode as expected today," father Adrie told Wielerflits following the very popular and exciting Superprestige Diegem. "The efforts he has made over the past three days are hopeful for the coming weeks."

In front of a crowd of 20.000 fans, the Alpecin-Deceuninck rider was a very aggressive rider right from the start, many times attacking the race, mainly in the sand pit section in which he got gaps over his rivals of several different laps.

“If he were to see the race again, there is no reason to be disappointed," van der Poel senior continued. "He's disappointed now, but he's where he needs to be. Of course Mathieu is not yet top notch. These crosses and also the World Championships in February are not the most important. That is the classic month. Mathieu is building up and that is also the reason that he will soon leave for a training camp.”

The race was also marked by the large audience in the streets of Diegem. “It's good, but it has to be much safer. The inside bends were not properly deposited and also at the sandbox the public could get much too close to the riders," van der Poel commented. "If someone made a mistake there, you're almost in the audience. It's all going well now, but if it goes wrong, the riders are the victims."

“It should not become a trend. It's all well and good, but it can also be a few hours earlier. You arrive here and people are already drunk. We know this, this is the time of year. When it is early January, the schools will open again and the real fans will return," he added. "I think the riders should have a say. I really hope there are no new evening crosses. It's not so nice to work. And if you organize the cross so late, the course must be much safer.”

As for David van der Poel, who started his season late due to a back injury, Adrie has commented: “If you can then officially finish the race, you have ridden a good race. He just couldn't do that today. If the first three are not there, he can do that."

"The most important thing is that he has no or almost no problems with his back. I think it's great that he is always at the start and always tries to make something out of it. Hopefully he can get off to a good start soon, then you get a completely different cross," he concluded.