If there was ever a rider in need of fresh fields to conquer, the current prime candidate is Mathieu van der Poel in cyclo-cross, with a record-breaking elite men's total of eight World Championships wins now in his palmarès.
Not even Tadej Pogačar finds himself in the same position as Van der Poel right now, given that in terms of the biggest targets possible, an unprecedented tally of six Tour de France wins is at least 18 months and two titles away for the UAE Team Emirates-XRG racer. Pogačar has yet to equal Peter Sagan's total of three straight World Championships victories, too.
The Dutch star toyed with the idea of retiring after achieving his biggest cyclo-cross goal a few weeks back, and was certainly not ruling out the possibility after he succeeded, saying "maybe it's not a bad idea to skip one winter."
But any clues as to his actual intentions, or whether he'd make that as-yet-hypothetical single winter away a permanent line under his career, remain far blurrier.
It was only to be expected that the dearth of real information was going to spark a mini-feeding frenzy of questions about the subject in the Belgian and Dutch media. And sure enough, since Sunday evening and crossing the line triumph at Hulst, newspaper and website articles have abounded about possible extra motivations.
Amongst them? The upcoming Cyclo-cross World Championships in Hoogerheide in 2028 where his father Adrie, also a renowned specialist, organises his own race, the few events Van der Poel has yet to win in cyclo-cross, the fact that 10 titles sounds better than eight, and even (should financial inspiration play a part in his decision) some deep dives into how much money he'd made out of the cyclo-cross World Cups this winter.
"After the finish, I said to him as a joke: eight is very nice, but ten is even nicer," Dutch national trainer Gerben De Knegt told WielerFlits. "As you know, he likes round numbers."
"Mathieu did say that he once mentioned that a winter without cyclo-cross might be interesting, but he didn't say that he's actually decided to do so. Or that he'll retire after next year.
"Ten world titles in Hoogerheide... I think that's probably what he's thinking."
De Knegt added that Van der Poel had pointed to Tibor Del Grosso, second at Hulst, and said he was his successor. But he also pointed out that at 31, there was no sense that Van der Poel was on the point of losing his current crushing superiority.
Belgian newspaper Nieuwsblad weighed in on the debate on Tuesday, pointing out that while Van der Poel now holds the elite mens's all-time record, he's still yet to overtake Marianne Vos total of eight titles as well.
"If Van der Poel truly wants to become the undisputed greatest, he'll need to add at least one more. So, should he start in Ostend next year after all?" the newspaper asked rhetorically.
Nieuwsblad also did some serious digging into the races yet to be won that might spur Van der Poel – should he be a completist – to go on and came up with the Kermiscross in Ardooie. Indeed, as they said, he'd never actually taken part in that particular race.
Then there was the financial question. After diligent calculations, ranging from the €5,000 for each World Cup plus €30,000 as overall winner to the €350 for winning the Exact Cross in Mol, Nieuwsblad came up with a total of €78,500 as the amount Van der Poel made from CX this year. However, the start money Van der Poel likely received in most of the non-World Cup races was not included in the equation and that could well provide a considerable boost to the total.
While these are all potential ingredients, the key component of the recipe will likely be what Van der Poel feels when racing cyclo-cross. He was 'unable to resist' a last-minute participation in Benidorm, for example, even if he'd ruled it out earlier in the week. Decisions like that, perhaps, say more than any other factor about Van der Poel's likely future in cyclo-cross.
"He has said several times that he wants to retire at an absolute peak," De Knegt told Wielerflits. "The next few years will tell when that will be. But on paper, he could still be around for a while. He himself says he enjoys cyclo-cross more than ever.
"The only question [in the future] is how much decline he'll face. [But] if you look at him now, he's glowing with health."
