Van der Poel will not be at the XC World Cup in Andorra

One of the big doubts for this weekend's XC World Cup in Andorra was whether the recently proclaimed Road World Champion Mathieu van der Poel would be on the start line. But it seems that the Dutchman has not yet decided what his second half of the season will be like and for the time being we will not see him racing in mountain biking.

Mathieu van der Poel will not be in Andorra

Mathieu van der Poel has long since put an end to those months in which he raced every weekend regardless of the modality and went all out in every cyclocross, road or mountain bike race. It was in the middle of 2022 when he decided that his training and racing would change to try to achieve more victories and it could be said that this philosophy is the reason why he has had a discreet Tour in exchange for the victory in the Road World Championships 2 weeks ago. And following with it now Van der Poel has decided not to race in Andorra and to focus again on his training.

The Alpecin rider has been saying for years that one of the main goals in his career is to win an Olympic Games in mountain biking and for that this season he should try to get a place for the Netherlands that would give him the opportunity to be on the starting line of Paris 2024. This led to the assumption that we would see him in the World Championships and in some World Cup races trying to get UCI points. But after his crash at the last World Championships and the Olympic place won by U-23 Tom Schellekens for the Netherlands, Van der Poel's plans seem to have changed.

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We will not see him at the World Cup in Andorra and the doubt remains whether he will prefer to wear his brand new rainbow jersey in some road races or will be in one of the remaining XC World Cup races, Les Gets, in France, or one of the races in America, which is quite unlikely.