"We have no regrets": Belgians accept Mathieu van der Poel's dominance

The Cyclocross World Championship in Hulst turned into a great Dutch celebration last weekend. Yet, after the event, we didn’t find a dissatisfied Belgian national coach Angelo De Clercq in front of our camera.

Rightfully so, by the way. The "blauwhemden" (blue shirts) surprisingly guided Alpecin-Premier Tech rider Aaron Dockx to the world title in the under-23 category. Along with Giel Lejeune’s third place in the juniors and a bronze medal for the Belgian team in the Mixed Team Relay with Thibau Nys, De Clercq achieved his ambition of four medals in Hulst. By comparison, the Netherlands took nine.

Blot on the women’s results
“Especially with the men’s youth riders, we can look back on a very good World Championship,” said De Clercq. “When you win that under-23 world title, you know you’ve done well and the future looks bright. On the women’s side, we just missed the podium with Fleur (Moors, ed.). That’s unfortunate, but she can’t blame herself. We would have loved to stand on the podium there—it would have brought a different balance to the results. But the goals have been met.”

The biggest blot on the Belgian week may have been Marion Norbert-Riberolle with the elite women. She fought hard for medals but after a shove on Czech rider Kristyna Zemanova, she was disqualified. To make matters worse, she then suffered a heavy crash. “I think she was doing very well. That crash and the incident is very unfortunate. But otherwise, Marion rode a very good race,” the national coach put into perspective.

“Thibau Nys is doing perfectly”
As so often, the elite race makes or breaks the balance. Leader Thibau Nys had indicated beforehand that he wanted to start fast and try to follow the top favorite Mathieu van der Poel, which he succeeded in doing. “The focus had to be there because it had gone wrong a few times before. First and foremost, it was up to him to be in the right position. If that hadn’t happened, we would have made sure he got through. Luckily, that wasn’t necessary.”

“Thibau was even the first Belgian off the line at the start, which was under control at that moment. He’s doing it perfectly and in the end it’s just about the legs,” said De Clercq. His leader eventually finished third. It’s a very beautiful podium. Of course, at some point you hope for a silver. But besides Mathieu, Tibor Del Grosso was too strong at the end as well.”

“Thibau came under pressure and made a few mistakes. I think he did everything to try to get that silver. That didn’t happen, and that’s no shame against Tibor.”

“Just enjoy it”
De Clercq can also say the same about the supremacy of winner and brand-new record holder Mathieu van der Poel. “I think we have a very nice podium and a successful World Championship. Mathieu is a fantastic athlete. You can only admire him a lot. It may not be thrilling, but we have to enjoy it. He’s the best athlete I’ve ever seen ride a bike.”