In matching the record of the late Erik De Vlaeminck, the 29-year-old Dutchman also benefited again from the bad luck of his eternal rival Wout van Aert, who endured the worst of starts and never came close to making it the tightly raced contest many fans had anticipated, though he rode a very strong race to finish second.
As he had in the World Cup race last weekend in Maasmechelen, where van Aert crashed on the first lap, van der Poel accelerated with about half of the first of eight 2.8km laps to go and ended all suspense in about 10 pedal strokes. He led by 20 seconds (over Laurens Sweeck) at the end of lap 1, by 45 seconds (over Belgian and European champion Thibaud Nys) at the end of lap 2 and by 46 seconds (over van Aert!) at the end of lap 3.
Van der Poel’s winning margin over van Aert was 45 seconds, which shows that the mano a mano everyone was hoping for might have been a real contest if van Aert, who started from the fourth row, had not been caught up in traffic and forced to the barriers in a typically chaotic start.
“I knew it had to be good at the start, but it was completely against me,” said van Aert after the race. “In the first corner I almost went into the fences. As a result, it took a long time before I got a little space and could move up. Of course, I had hoped for a different scenario. But I knew this was a possibility, so I tried to stay calm.”
He was way back in 37th place in the field when he could finally ride out of the traffic and stretch his legs. And it took him nearly three laps to catch the small group of riders chasing the runaway leader. He managed to drop everyone in that group except the Belgian Joris Nieuwenhuis, who was riding a strong race after returning to racing following a lengthy absence due to a bad case of shingles. But in lap 5, van Aert took advantage of a bike change by Nieuwenhuis to open a gap that never grew smaller.
Nieuwenhuis was ultimately also overtaken by Nys and finished fourth, 1:15 behind the winner, while Nys finished at 1:06 and joined the two best cyclocross riders in the world on the world championship podium.
As for van der Poel, he simply did what he always does, ride away and almost never look back, though this time he said that he took his cue from the dominant winner of the U23 race, fellow Dutchman Tibor del Grosso. “We saw it yesterday with the U23: the best tactic is often to ride in the lead right away and do your own thing,” he said immediately after the race. “Especially on this course because it was super, super tricky and there were a lot of problems to get into the pedals as well. If you are in a group then it is even more annoying. I just tried to get a big gap to discourage the chasers a bit. That worked.”
He can say that again. In winning, he said that he had to overcome an unwelcome equipment issue. “After I had created a nice gap, I was very afraid of a flat tire,” van der Poel said.” He had reason to fear, because his front tire went flat on lap 3. “I had a puncture immediately after the equipment post and had to ride with a flat front tire for a while. That took a lot of energy. After that, I was very careful.”
Naturally, tying De Vlaeminck’s record, which has been on the books since 1973, was a dream come true. “His record had been on the tables for a long time,” van der Poel said. “When I started in the elite category, I dreamed of winning one world title. But I never thought I could become world champion seven times.”
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Marianne Vos holds the record for most cyclocross world championships, having won the title eight times. Van der Poel was asked if he would go for an eight title in 2026. “We’ll see,” he said. “I’ll enjoy this world title first.”
Saturday’s women’s world championship race was what people had hoped the men’s race would be, as the Dutch riders Fem van Empel and Lucinda Brand battled head-to-head for more than three of the race’s six laps, trading leads, opening and losing gaps, landing and taking blows from the other like boxers in a furious heavyweight championship fight. Which it was, since van Empel and Brand are the heavyweights of women’s cyclocross, with Brand having won the world championship in 2022 and van Empel winning the last two, defeating Brand by more than a minute each time.
This year it came down to a small, muddy rise 200 meters from the finish line. Van Empel soared over it, but Brand – who was on her rival’s wheel – appeared to lose hold on a pedal and came to a stop at the top of the rise. Van Empel raced away to win her third successive world title, while Brand was left to wonder what might have been. The winner’s 18-second margin at the finish was the result of Brand’s slowing down and perhaps shedding a tear after leaving everything she had on the course. Both riders did and they delivered a race for the ages.
Another Dutch rider, Puck Pieterse, who had ridden with van Empel and Brand for nearly three stages and stayed on their heels until lap 5, finished third at 1:09.
“When I crossed the finish line, I didn’t realize I had won. I had to go so far for it,” an exhausted van Empel said after the race. “Mentally it was tough. This is an emotional victory.” She went on to praise her rival, saying: “I knew it was going to be a tough fight. Lucinda Brand was a great competitor today. She’s having an incredible season and I’m happy to have her on the podium. Respect to her.”
She wealso said that bike change tactics had played a big role in the running of the race. “Lucinda decided not to change bikes in the second pit stop. I did, which meant I was always in a gap”, van Empel said. “But the steep slopes after that pit stop were my thing. I was always able to get back into that zone, although it always cost me strength.”
Brand, who won the Cyclo-cross World Cup championship last weekend, was despondent in defeat. “You know that the moments that you come this close to the title are becoming rare. That makes it really hard, obviously,” she said.
She went on to complain about a move by her rival on the final lap, when Brand made a move to surge to the front after a curve, but van Empel seemed to swerve and take her into the fences. “I tried to be ahead of her toward the off-camber section. She rode me skillfully into the barriers. That blew my move,” Brand explained. “Afterwards I wasn’t able to turn that into positive aggression, which I’m usually capable of doing. That surprised me. Probably, my legs were dead. It wasn’t a nice move and I think I can assume that more people think the same.”
But Brand was sporting enough to admit that the strongest rider had won. “Yeah, sure, otherwise she wouldn’t have won,” she said. “If I would have been strong enough I would’ve found a way to get around her at that point. Probably she would’ve just beat me on the asphalt. I just don’t think it was necessary to ride that way.”
Results Elite Men’s Cyclocross World Championship
- Mathieu van der Poel, Netherlands, 1:02:44
- Wout van Aert, Belgium + 0:45
- Thibaud Nys, Belgium 1:06
- Joris Nieuwenhuis, Netherlands 1:15
- Emiel Verstrynge, Belgium 1:53
- Toon Aerts, Belgium 1:56
- Michael Vanthourenhout, Belgium 2:00
- Joran Wyseure, Belgium 2:03
- Lars van der Haar, Netherlands 2:09
- Laurens Sweeck, Belgium 2:28
Results Elite Women’s Cyclocross World Championship
- Fem van Empel, Netherlands 54:29
- Lucinda Brand, Netherlands 0:18
- Puck Pieterse, Netherlands 1:09
- Inge van der Heijden, Netherlands 1:31
- Blanka Vas, Hungary 1:56
- Sara Casasola, Italy 2:11
- Carmen Alvarado, Netherlands 2:36
- Hélène Clauzel, France 2:51
- Sanne Cant, Belgium 2:53
- Amandine Fouquenet, France 2:58
