Mathieu van der Poel Impresses on Mountain Bike Comeback in Les Gets

Mathieu van der Poel made his mark at the World Cup in Les Gets. The Dutch rider from Alpecin-Deceuninck managed to move from the back of the field to the leading group in his mountain bike comeback. Van der Poel looked particularly strong on the climbs. Two laps from the finish, he still seemed to have a shot at victory, but in the final lap he had to give in.

The World Cup round in Les Gets was mainly in the spotlight because of Mathieu van der Poel's participation. With two weeks to go until the Mountain Bike World Championships in Switzerland, he wanted to measure himself against the world’s best in the Alps. The leader of Alpecin-Deceuninck had a clear goal beforehand, after a mediocre MTB campaign earlier this spring. “The most important thing is to try to finish the race and get a full race effort in the legs. Hopefully, that will help for the World Championships in two weeks,” he said.

In the French race, Van der Poel started from the fifth row. He hadn’t scored any MTB points this year but didn’t have to start at the very back due to his high position in the UCI Road Ranking. Still, Van der Poel slipped back toward 50th place in the congested start, putting him about 25 seconds behind the race leader early on.

Full throttle on the climbs and cautious descending: Van der Poel heads for top-10
Van der Poel ended up in a large group and moved up toward the top-30 by the end of the first lap. A leading group of seven had formed up front, but behind them, the Dutchman demanded all attention by approaching the top 20. In fact, he moved up to fifteenth and kept the gap to the leader Luca Martin to no more than 30 seconds.

At the start of the third lap (of eight), Van der Poel sensed the top 10 was within reach. He really let his legs do the talking on the climbs, while taking few risks on the technical sections. Mid-race, MVDP claimed tenth place, and as the pace at the front momentarily eased, he closed in on the lead group.

🚵🇫🇷 | Mathieu van der Poel has ridden from the back into the leading group but is now struggling in the French Les Gets. Just over two laps to go!

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— Eurosport Nederland (@Eurosport_NL) August 31, 2025

Leading group sees Van der Poel closing in in second half
Van der Poel made a move on the first long climb during the fifth lap, cutting the gap to the front from 22 to 7 seconds. This brought him onto the tail of the eight-rider leading group with three laps remaining. Once again, he avoided risks on the descent, which caused him to hang on the elastic a bit. However, this didn’t cause problems as he made up for it on the climbs.

Up front, the leading group accelerated under Luca Martin, Mathias Flückiger, and Luca Braidot, causing some splits. Van der Poel was behind them and had to start chasing. He began the penultimate lap in sixth place, not far from the leaders, allowing MVDP still to dream of victory. With that in mind, after more than an hour of racing, he boldly joined the rest of the lead group.

Flückiger, Braidot, and Martin managed to drop Van der Poel on the descent, but the Dutchman came back again on the climb. A now-familiar tactic, but after a second acceleration at the front, MVDP faced an eight-second deficit going into the final lap.

At the start of the last lap, Italian champion Braidot attacked. He immediately opened a gap on Flückiger and Martin and rode Van der Poel out to more than 20 seconds. It seemed the elastic had finally snapped for the Alpecin-Deceuninck rider. After a strong final lap, home favorite Luca Martin ultimately took the win ahead of Braidot and Flückiger. A spent MVDP finished sixth, one minute behind the winner.