This Sunday, Mathieu van der Poel swapped asphalt for mountain paths. The Dutch runner participated in the Olympic distance test of the Mountain bike Organized on August 31 in Gets (France). Several months after his last appearance in mountain biking – marked by two falls and a small fracture in hand – he found the discipline. This time, everything has gone much better: the representative ofAlpecin-DECEUNINCK took the sixth place in a race won by the Frenchman Luca Martin.
VIDEO – The GTT World Cup in Gets … with Luca Martin!
“I lacked this landmark we need to do well in mountain biking”
“With a little more luck, I could even have gathered more”said Van der Poel After the Aurpès race of Cycling flash. “Everything that could have been wrong, in the first round, went wrong. I made all kinds of errors and I found myself behind runners in difficulty. It was a shame to start like that. Then, I was able to catch up with the head group, but in the descent, I lost ground. It was there that I lost the race.”
The result remains encouraging, especially since Van der Poel only rushed from the 33rd position on the grid: “I felt good, even if I lacked this mark that we need to do well, that's why I chose to keep my rhythm and swing with the tail of the head group. In the end, I saw that the position was assured and I took advantage of it.” The service is in any case more convincing than in Nové Mesto … “Certainly”,, smiles MVDP, “The initial objective was to stay in balance on the bike … I did it. I had fun and I seemed to improve my tour. I can be satisfied with my race.”
