Wout Van Aert arrived at the Benidorm circuit by bicycle. He is not far away from the team’s concentration and while he was warming up for the cyclocross he was training for the road. As if nothing altered him before a duel that he has experienced dozens of times against Mathieu van der Poel. Rivals on the road and rivals in cyclocross. Parallel races in which he almost always wins Mathieu. But not this time.
Van der Poel is not intimidated by thousands of eyes focusing on him. When he gets off his bike he could pass for one of the Dutch people who flood the beaches of Benidorm in summer. When he gets into the machine he becomes an alien. It doesn’t matter that he suffers a mechanical breakdown on the first lap, a chain failure that forced him to overtake cyclists as if he were a motorcycle overtaking pedestrians. It was spectacular to see him on the stretch of asphalt devouring rivals like the one who gobbles jelly beans in the cinema seat. Different speeds, different species.
Van der Poel recovered and appeared ready for battle with Wout Van Aert. He was leading in the final laps and was preparing to deliver the final blow, but he got stuck in the sand. A fall forced him to start over. He once again overtakes cyclists at unsuspected speeds. In a city where there are radars that fine cars traveling at speeds above 15 kilometers per hour, Van der Poel’s legs should be illegal. But he fell below tenth place and there was no time for him to recover. He gave him time to enter fifth at the finish line. A few seconds behind Van Aert, who got rid of Van der Poel, but not Vanthourenhout, a Belgian like him, who displays the European champion jersey on his back.
Van der Poel’s fall convinced Van Aert that the victory was his, but he had to leave Vanthourenhout behind. Just as Van der Poel had done before to come back, he took advantage of the stretch of asphalt in which none of the specialists are able to follow those who are also stars on the route to leave on the last lap. The race was already his. Or not. When he reached the section of the planks he got off the bike to belay instead of jumping them. But when he reassembled it, everything could have fallen apart. Tiredness made him miscalculate when trying to put his leg over the saddle and he fell to the ground. The distance was not that great and nerves plagued him. He managed to get on the bike, although he lost his glasses, and followed the path to stand on the bike and raise his arms as the winner.
It was revenge from last year, when he lost the race in the last meter against Van der Poel. Although in pain, he was able to celebrate. “Yesterday my mother broke her wrist. I also hurt my wrist a little, but I was wearing number 13 because I knew today was my day,” he confessed after his victory.
It is the first defeat in cyclocross this season for Van der Poel. Also the first victory for Van Aert. And he did it in front of all the best, because there was also Tom Pidcock, who arrived with his Porsche to the race. It was difficult for the Briton to catch on to the leading group, he managed to get first, but he fell back again, unable to keep up with Van Aert, Van der Poel and Vanthourenhout. They were all there and also Felipe Orts, the champion of Spain, who finished eighth and who held out for a long time with the first. It is the second best position of the season for him. He ended up being covered by his friends in a race that was held ten kilometers from his house.
The victory does not change Van Aert’s plans, who skips the World Championship and will no longer participate this year in the cyclocross season and skips the World Championship. Meanwhile, Benidorm boasts that the two best riders at the moment in the specialty have won both races. editions of his career.
2024-01-21 16:34:24
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