Mathieu van der Poel

So it's quite cool to see like a sort of a breakout ride there, which then came to fruition and he played a big role in the Tour squad.

But my fan moment of the year was seeing Mathieu van der Poel come past us on the moor.

We were at the top at Omloop Newsblad.

I've never actually seen him at the front of the race like that in the flesh before.

I can tell you what Kylian

said.

He said it was Mathieu van der Poel's final stage win of the Tour de France, which it has to be said was one of the most thrilling moments in the last God knows how many years in cycling.

Undeniable.

but other than those guys we see a little track where development team speaking of kind of development teams but they've been making a few signings i mentioned them earlier but aki barons who's nicholas barons's brother the rider who ride who obviously won the 23 road race when it was in uh switzerland And yeah, but he was also very good in the Tour of Luxembourg.

Remember, he was the one guy who could follow Mathieu van der Poel on his stage one attack.

But we're also bringing in a very exciting rider called Michael Hettiger, an Austrian climber, second in Giro d'Italia.

Ligiana, second of the I'm Bougie Val Romitor, only behind Benjamin Noval and only by 36 seconds.

No, no, no, no.

When Van Aert comes, when Van der Poel comes, he'll have a few more to tick off his hump.

But if Nijs wouldn't have crashed, it probably wouldn't have come down to a last lap battle.

No.

Strade Bianche, Milano-San Remo, Flanders.

34 seconds on Van der Poel at the Ronda, then off to the Basque Country days later like it was a cafe ride.

Velo News has Pogacar and Demi Vollering headlining the nominees.

My question isn't whether he wins.

And his most significant crash and subsequent injury was breaking his wrist in Liège, wasn't it, a few years ago, which clearly did affect his run into the Tour, which he lost to Jonas.

But comparing him to other riders like Remco, even like Mathieu, Wout, he hasn't had that many crashes and he hasn't had that many obstacles thrown in his way in terms of injuries.

And that could be due to just his innate skill as a bike rider, the fact that he's always in the right place at the right time.

There's an element of luck there, but quite often there are certain riders who crash more because they just don't ride as well.

I mean, you look at like Van der Poel's delighted with second unexpected.

Brandon, not really knowing what the hell had happened.

And Mathieu Van der Poel looking like this.

Yeah.

And in Jasper Philipsen's case, he didn't even win from a flat sprint, bunch mass sprint.

It was more of a breakaway situation with Van der Poel being in the breakaway and then collaborating, getting a perfect lead out in that one sprint.

breakaway resulting in the victory of Jasper Philipsen that day.

Three stages at Renault Tour, Copenhagen Sprint, which completely forgot that that race existed to begin with.

They were leaving him- In the bunch of sprints.

In the bunch sprints, yeah, the lead outs were like they were decelerating and all going too early.

But then on stage 17 when he won, obviously Van Der Poel did a fantastic job for him.

So, yeah, I do feel like both of them are not...

There was that stat, wasn't there, about the monuments over the course of about three or four years.

It was, I think, just Van der Poel, Pogacar, and Aynepoel who won almost all the monuments for many years.

I think Jasper Philipsen winning San Remo was the only exception.

World champs and Olympics too in that time.