{"id":160131,"date":"2017-05-29T09:14:31","date_gmt":"2017-05-29T07:14:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mtb-mag.com\/?p=160131\/"},"modified":"2017-05-29T09:20:08","modified_gmt":"2017-05-29T07:20:08","slug":"worldcup-albstadt-has-schurter-found-his-next-rival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mtb-mag.com\/en\/worldcup-albstadt-has-schurter-found-his-next-rival\/","title":{"rendered":"Worldcup Albstadt: has Schurter found his next rival?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mathieu van der Poel (born 19 January 1995) is a Dutch cyclist, who currently competes in the cyclo-cross and road bicycle racing disciplines of the sport for the Beobank\u2013Corendon team.\u00a0He is best known for winning the Cyclo-cross World Championships, in T\u00e1bor, Czech Republic in 2015, the Junior Road Race World Championships in Florence, Italy in 2013,\u00a0and twice winning the Junior Cyclo-cross World Championships, in Koksijde, Belgium in 2012,\u00a0and Louisville, USA in 2013; the first rider to win multiple titles at that level.<\/em><\/p>\n

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That’s what Wikipedia says (until now) about the 22 years old athlete that yesterday finished second behind Olympic Champion Nino Schurter. This is the same guy that last week, in Nove Mesto<\/a>, started in the 90th position and finished 8th.<\/p>\n

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The race was quite dramatic: Fl\u00fcckinger, Van der Poel and Schurter\u00a0kept a brutal pace right from the start, building a gap with the chasers.<\/p>\n

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Brutal, but it became even more brutal in the 4th lap, when Nino accelerated and the two others started making mistakes. Van der Poel had a minor crash, but he lost Nino’s wheel and he wasn’t able to close the gap until the finish line.<\/p>\n

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Fl\u00fcckinger\u00a0had also a small crash, he jumped back on his bike and, thinking he was too slow for the bunny hop he usually did in the next step down, he overcooked it and crashed spectacularly.<\/p>\n