Mathieu van der Poel might move up few rows at the MTB start thanks to a loophole

Mathieu van der Poel may receive a welcome windfall towards the World Championships mountain biking next Saturday. The Dutchman from Alpecin-Deceuninck should normally be on the very last row, but it could just be that he ends up on row four through a loophole. And that could theoretically make his catch-up race a lot easier in Scotland...

In mountain bike World Cup races, riders who are in the top ten ranking in another cycling discipline are allowed to take a seat further in front. Van der Poel is currently sixth in the UCI World Ranking for road cycling and fifth in the same ranking for cyclocross, so he falls under that special arrangement in World Cup races.

A small problem: the technical guide of this year's mountain biking World Championships does not indicate that riders have a special arrangement based on their performance in the other disciplines. There we simply read that the riders are lined up at the start in order of the UCI Ranking.

The World Championships organization in Glentress Forest, Scotland is currently looking at the possibility of adjusting this, so that the technical guide largely corresponds to competitions in the World Cup and Van der Poel can therefore start a few rows further from the front. That would then be in the fourth row, In de Leiderstrui reports. But will the other riders fighting for an Olympic starting ticket be so happy about that?