Wout van Aert will start at the Cyclo-cross World Championships in Liévin: “This will also give me a boost for my goals on the road”

The three-time world champion had previously indicated that the title fight did not fit into his schedule and therefore did not make himself available for the upcoming world championship. Van Aert has now changed his mind, partly because of the good feeling he had on the bike in Maasmechelen on Saturday. Despite some technical errors, the Kempen native finished second behind an unapproachable Mathieu van der Poel.

Van Aert is a three-time world champion – from 2016 to 2018 – and must now become the main challenger to outgoing world champion Van der Poel, who hopes to win his seventh world title in Liévin. It will be Van Aert’s sixth race of the season, he won the crosses in Gullegem and Dendermonde. Last year in Tabor, Van Aert was not present at the World Cup.

Van Aert’s road season starts in Jaén (17/2) and then runs via the Tour of the Algarve (19/2), the Belgian opening weekend with the Omloop het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne (1 and 2/3).

Choice out of love for cross

Van Aert himself immediately came up with an explanation for the choice. “I feel good and my winter went well. The idea only occurred to me recently. After Maasmechelen, the Belgian team coach, my coach at Visma-Lease a Bike and I decided to participate anyway. I’m excited to start in such a great race and I think this extra boost will do me good in the run-up to bigger goals down the road. Of course my preparation has been completely different, but I will do my best.”

Head of Performance for the Dutch team, Mathieu Heijboer, also explained his teammate’s participation: “Wout is a real cyclo-cross enthusiast. He indicated that he wanted to race. We discussed it, weighed everything up together and as a team we fully support Wout.”

(gvdl)