King of Antwerpen 👑 Last lap and MVDP is cruising with +35s gap on van Aert who starts to power away from Iserbyt! @SportPic_Agency #CXWorldCup
Magnificent Mathieu van der Poel blitzes the field for first UCI World Cup win of the winter in Antwerp
CyclocrossSaturday, 23 December 2023 at 16:12
Recovering from a slow start, Mathieu van der Poel has absolutely dominated what was a world-class field in Antwerp.
In a nightmare start for two of the big guns, Tom Pidcock had issues, holding up Mathieu van der Poel in the process. As the pair attempted to pick their way back through the field, Joris Nieuwenhuis, Eli Iserbyt and Michael Vanthourenhout were the early front runners although there weren't any real differences.
On lap 3 however, van der Poel had got himself right back to the front of proceedings. He didn't waste long recovering before kicking clear either, the world champion accelerating through the sand to extend into a lead. Once he made his move, that was it and van der Poel quickly rode out of sight. In seemingly no time at all, the Dutchman was over 20 seconds clear.
Behind the dominant, sole leader, the battle for second was intriguing as a big group were still locked together.
Entering the final lap, van der Poel's lead had upped to near a minute, whilst behind, Eli Iserbyt and Wout van Aert were proving the best of the rest. In the end, it was van Aert who won the race for second with Iserbyt having to settle for the final spot on the podium.
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- Barring injuries, by the time Pogacar's dominance fads there will be lots of new young talent. Pogacar is about 1 1/2 years older than Remco. That's nothing.Sweep20-12-2024
- I actually don’t find that too impressive. In my later forties I did similar figures for a 3.5% gradient as a total nobody with no wind assistance. Am sure there’s margin for improvement there, especially looking at all the names on that list.Mistermaumau20-12-2024
- Jonas', was 6 years agospock12320-12-2024
- The race where he overnight suddenly turned nuclear after being packfodder at best for several years. His Sky days after that Vuelta and Pogačar’s last season shall remain the darkest post Lance stuff cycling has witnessed. Good riddance Froome.
UltimateOpportunist20-12-2024 - Finishing the Vuelta seems to be a reasonably attainable goal. Getting on the team to do that will be the more difficult challenge.
santiagobenites20-12-2024 - To be fair, he has now stated his fuel regime had been corrected and the results concur.Mistermaumau20-12-2024
- You can look at things mathematically sometimes to get a better understanding of performance distribution. To be an elite cyclist you may need a number of qualities, say 8 some of which are quite obvious (engine), some more debatable (body type). If you look at distribution you’ll get a whole bunch with 6 or 7 very elevated values but 1-2 not so perfect and occasionally someone will pop up with all 8 really well developed. However, statistically, for that to be a given the chances drop by about an order of magnitude each time so in general for each 2 at the top you’ll have 20 at the next level, 200 at tge 3rd, 2000, etc. I don’t see the actual distribution as so weird, we have a few too many right at the very top level but statistically it’s just because for the past 15-20 years there wasn’t really anyone clearly standing out, level 1 was bunched with level two.Mistermaumau20-12-2024
- Froome is still riding? I thought he just dressed out and appeared at team photoshoots.Sweep20-12-2024
- Well, I’d say that like is more likely to attract line when it comes to certain interests and cycling is probably one of them. The rowdy alcohol swaying type as an example, that features occasionally but EACh time there is an incident is obviously an exception amongst cycling fans. We are not very vocal about our passion which is understandable considering the little interest an average person has so it often takes special circumstances for us to discover our peers :-)Mistermaumau20-12-2024
- Mas... Challenge Pogi!!! Ha Ha Haabstractengineer20-12-2024