The Elite Men’s race at the 2020 Cyclocross World Championships in Dübendorf, Switzerland may not have delivered the last-lap drama of the thrilling Elite Women’s race, but it still offered a chance to appreciate generational greatness in a wire-to-wire win by Mathieu van der Poel.
From thirty feet off the line, Van der Poel had a clear lead and for the next 68 minutes, was never passed.
It was a tour de force for the biggest male star in cycling.
This season, Van der Poel will spread his attention between the Spring Classics, Olympic mountain bike dreams, cyclocross and perhaps even the Vuelta, but he’ll always be a cyclocrosser in our eyes. Let’s appreciate his greatness while we can. He won all but one cyclocross race this season, and did the same last season.
Not to be lost in Van der Poel’s dominance was an impressive silver medal by Tom Pidcock in his first-ever Elite Men’s race, another consistent ride by World Cup overall winner Toon Aerts, and the return and near medal-winning-ride by comeback kid Wout van Aert.
Watch four percent of the heavy, muddy Elite Men’s race in the highlights below.
