“I don’t have much of a chance”: Van der Poel shrugs off the pressure ahead of the XCO World Championships

Mathieu van der Poel arrives at the XCO World Championship 2026 as one of the top contenders for the rainbow jersey after his surprising second place in Les Gets. However, the Dutchman has been insisting for days that his performance may be affected by starting from the fifth row and having to make up ground while his main rivals start ahead.

Van der Poel points out the start as the main difficulty of the World Championship

Mathieu van der Poel's performance in the last World Cup in Les Gets cleared up much of the doubts about what his level could be in Val di Sole. After almost a year without competing in mountain biking, he finished tenth in the Short Track and performed even better in the XCO, where he was second, just 7 seconds behind Adrien Boichis.

But right after that race, Van der Poel warned that the scenario would be very different in the World Championship. In Les Gets, his tenth position in the XCC allowed him to start from the second row for the XCO and immediately enter the front group. An advantage he will not have now.

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"As I said, I think the starting position is quite important and there I will be back in the fifth row, so I need a bit of luck," he explained then.

Just a few days later, and already from Val di Sole, the Dutchman has once again focused exactly on the same problem.

"It will be very exciting to see what happens. As I said, starting from the fifth row you need to have a bit of luck. You just have to keep going, go with how the race develops, and hope to make it to the front," Van der Poel explains.

In an XCO where the first minutes are usually raced at maximum intensity, any bottleneck or split can force him to expend a great deal of energy before even connecting with the favorites.

 

 

 

 

 

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"I know I have little chance, but I'm here to try"

Van der Poel acknowledges that the solution to avoid these situations would be to compete in more mountain bike races and accumulate the necessary points to achieve a much better starting position. But fitting a broader MTB calendar with the rest of his season remains complicated.

"I would love to spend a bit more time on the mountain bike and compete in more races to get a better position on the starting grid, but it's not always easy to balance everything. I'm happy to be here and to try. I know I have little chance, but I'm here to try and take that opportunity".

Despite that cautious discourse, what was seen in Les Gets makes Van der Poel inevitably arrive as one of the top favorites. There he was able to ride the entire race with the best and only Boichis managed to surpass him after dropping him in the last lap.

And precisely the Frenchman reappears as the great reference in Val di Sole, as we already saw in the preview of the XCO World Championship 2026.

About the circuit. It seems to have left good feelings for Van der Poel during the first recognitions.

"It's always nice to compete in Italy. I think the Italian fans are always very passionate. It's a circuit that I really like. It's been a while since I've been here and they've made some changes, but I still like the circuit."

On Sunday we will know how far he can go. This time, to fight for what would be one of the titles still missing in his palmarès, Van der Poel will first have to win a race within the race: the comeback from the fifth row.