Despite his multidisciplinary skills, Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech) is still struggling to combine mountain biking and road racing as he tries to win the elusive cross-country MTB world title.
Van der Poel is racing the Tour de Suisse this week, thus missing chances to race MTB at the Leogang and Lenzerheide World Cups. After deciding not to start the Nové Město World Cup in May, and heading to the Tour de France next, he will go into August, the month of the World Championships, with no MTB racing under his belt.
The World Championships take place August 26-30 in Val di Sole, Italy, with only one World Cup round possible for Van der Poel after the Tour: the stop in Les Gets, France on August 20-23.
"I only wanted to ride two races on the MTB, but that didn’t happen," Van der Poel told Nieuwsblad on Tuesday before the Tour de Suisse. "I had some back issues at the time, but they were resolved quickly. I still want to do the World Championships, but that would mean another double preparation."
Van der Poel's road ranking will ensure he gets a spot on the start line for World Championships, should he want to race, but being race-ready is a tough ask, given he is now focusing on the Tour, where he will lead-out Jasper Philipsen and go for stages himself.
Despite the challenges, Van der Poel has long been clear that the MTB world title is a big career goal of his, and he seemed committed to trying this year even without a perfect run-in.
"We wanted to do the preparation for the Tour perfectly now, so we could focus on the mountain bike afterwards. Then I should normally still have enough time," he said. "It will never be ideal, but I do want to give it a chance."
His lack of race experience and technical sharpness has cost Van der Poel before, famously crashing out of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and more recently doing the same at his 2025 debut in Nové Město where he crashed twice before quitting.
He has not won an MTB event since 2021, when he won two World Cup short-track races, and hasn't won an XCO race since 2019 where he was a fairly dominant force on the World Cup circuit. Since then, though, his success has been limited, last year taking sixth at the Les Gets World Cup and then 29th in the World Championships.
Whilst riders like Tom Pidcock seem to successfully balance both MTB and road – down to a whole host of factors, including different team ambitions, different rider type and different Grand Tour roles – Van der Poel has not quite managed to master the art of a double programme, and that doesn't look to be changing in 2026.
As for the road, the 31-year-old is in Switzerland this week racing for the first time since April, with aims to tune-up before the Tour and return to winning ways.
"I always try to win a stage, so I’m going to try to do that here too," he said. "I’ve had a good training camp and I feel good, so I’m confident."
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