Mathieu van der Poel

Van der Poel finished 50th out of the 84 riders to complete the course, over two minutes down on the eventual world champion Igor Decraene of Belgium.

In the road race, Van der Poel attacked on the final lap, and bridged up to the race leader Franck Bonnamour of France; he later distanced him on the final climb of Via Salviati – around 5 km from the finish – and soloed away to win the gold medal, ahead of Pedersen and Albania's Nikaj Iltjan.

His maternal grandfather was French cyclist Raymond Poulidor, winner of the 1964 Vuelta a España, who also finished the Tour de France in runner-up position three times and in third place five times.

Mathieu van der Poel (born 19 January 1995) is a Dutch professional cyclist who rides for the UCI WorldTeam.

He competes in the cyclo-cross, mountain biking and road racing disciplines of the sport.

He is best known for winning the Road Race World Championships in Glasgow in 2023 and the Junior Road Race World Championships in Florence in 2013 and is arguably the best cyclo-cross rider ever winning the Cyclo-cross World Championships in Tábor in 2015, Bogense in 2019, Dübendorf in 2020, Ostend in 2021, Hoogerheide in 2023, again Tábor in 2024 and twice winning the Junior Cyclo-cross World Championships, in Koksijde in 2012 and Louisville in 2013.

His father, Adri, is a former six-time Dutch National Champion and the World Cyclo-cross Champion for 1996; he was also twice a stage winner at the Tour de France and a winner of several Classics during his career.

In the process, Van der Poel became the first rider since Niels Albert in 2004 to take an under-23 race victory as a first-year rider.

Van der Poel made his debut in cyclo-cross during the 2009–10 season, competing in the novices ranks.

He won several local races, and at the National Championships in Heerlen, Van der Poel finished in second place, fifteen seconds behind champion Erik Kramer.

During the 2010–11 season, Van der Poel won all of the races that he contested; he also combined this with racing on the road in the summer of 2011, and won the Dutch Novice Time Trial Championships in Zwartemeer.

The following winter, Van der Poel advanced to the junior ranks, and was immediately dominant in this season; out of all the races he contested, he failed to finish first on only four occasions.

He also claimed the junior titles at National, European, and World Championship level, each one by a convincing margin.

During the 2012 road season, Van der Poel got his first general classification victory at the Ronde des Vallées; he also won the young rider classification at the same race.

Van der Poel was a member of the Dutch World Championship squad, when he competed in the junior road race; he finished within the 56-rider main group, and as the best-placed Dutch rider, in ninth position.

Picking up where he left off the previous winter, Van der Poel's 2012–13 cyclo-cross campaign was flawless; he contested thirty races, and won every single one of them.

Having defended his European title in the United Kingdom, Van der Poel maintained his Dutch title in Hilvarenbeek on the same day that his brother David won the Under-23 Championships.

The month after winning his Dutch title, Van der Poel became the first cyclist to defend his junior world title, by winning the race in Louisville, Kentucky, ahead of teammate Martijn Budding.

Born in Kapellen, van der Poel comes from a family of professional cyclists; his brother David was also prominent in cyclo-cross racing, winning the 2013 National Under-23 Championships in Hilvarenbeek.

In the 2013 road season, Van der Poel contested several Nations' Cup Juniors events for the Dutch national team.

At the Course de la Paix, Van der Poel won the opening stage in a six-rider select group; he held the race lead into the following day, where Mads Pedersen assumed the race lead for the remainder of the race in an individual time trial around Třebenice.

Van der Poel finished third, behind Pedersen and Logan Owen.

His next appearance came at the Grand Prix Général Patton, where he soloed – from 14 km remaining – to a six-second victory on the race's second and final stage in Wincrange, en route to finishing second place overall, five seconds adrift of race-winner Christoffer Lisson of Denmark.

In the process, he also won the points and mountains sub-classifications.

Van der Poel booked stage victories at the Ain'Ternational–Rhône Alpes–Valromey Tour; riding for Enerthem-BKCP, he won a five-rider sprint on the opener, and defeated France's Élie Gesbert in a head-to-head finish on the final stage, to take the overall race victory by almost half a minute from Gesbert.

Prior to his next Nations Cup appearance, Van der Poel won the Dutch National Junior Road Race Championships in Chaam.

At the Trophée Centre Morbihan, Van der Poel won the race overall, having defended the race lead from the start, after winning a head-to-head sprint against Belarus' Aleksandr Riabushenko on the opening stage.

In the lead up to the World Championships, Van der Poel dominated the Grand Prix Rüebliland event, as he won the opening three of the race's four stages.

He won a three-rider sprint in Bettwil to win the opening stage, before a solo victory the following day in Leutwil, and a victory in a 9 km individual time trial in Hunzenschwil.

Pedersen got the better of Van der Poel in a bunch sprint on the final stage, but Van der Poel had done enough to win the race overall by 46 seconds over Pedersen.

This form made Van der Poel one of the favourites for the World Championships, where he would lead the Dutch squad.

In addition to competing in the road race, Van der Poel contested the junior time trial race for the Netherlands, along with Sam Oomen.

Van der Poel moved into the under-23 category ahead of the 2013–14 cyclo-cross season.

In his first race in the class, Van der Poel won the GP Mario De Clercq – in the BPost Bank Trophy – at Ronse, defeating nearest rival Gianni Vermeersch by twelve seconds.

After he finished third in his first World Cup race, Van der Poel won the second round of the season at Tábor in the Czech Republic, beating Vermeersch once again by three seconds.

As well as these international titles, Van der Poel is the winner of the Dutch National Cyclo-cross Championships between 2015 and 2020, the Dutch National Mountain Bike Cross-country Championships in 2018 and the Dutch National Road Race Championships in 2018 and 2020, as well as the Strade Bianche in 2021, the 2019 and 2022 editions of Dwars door Vlaanderen, the Brabantse Pijl in 2019 and the Amstel Gold Race in 2019.

He won a stage in the 2021 Tour de France and wore the yellow jersey, a stage in the 2022 Giro d'Italia and wore the pink jersey, won the 2019 Tour of Britain, the 2020 BinckBank Tour, the 2023 Tour of Belgium, the 2019 Grand Prix de Denain, the 2022 Grand Prix de Wallonie and the 2023 Super 8 Classic.

He also won the Cyclo-cross European Championships in Tábor in 2017, 's-Hertogenbosch in 2018 and Trebaseleghe in 2019, the Cross-country Mountain Bike European Championships in Brno in 2019 and twice the Junior Cyclo-cross European Championships, in Lucca in 2011 and Ipswich in 2012; the first rider to win at the highest level in three different cycling disciplines.

He won the Monuments Tour of Flanders in 2020 and 2022 and both Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix in 2023, the latter in record time.

His rivalry with Wout van Aert is considered among the greatest and longest lasting rivalries in the sport.