Mathieu Van Der Pol's new cyclocross European champion jersey may look fresh on his shoulders, but the Corendon-Circus rider is already looking ahead to the 2020 road season, and after two wins in two days on a cross bike, the early spring provisional He revealed his schedule.
Less than 24 hours after winning his third European championship in a row, Van der Pol scored his third win of the season at the Jaarmarktcross in Belgium on Monday. He later revealed that he hopes to run the cobbled classic in Italy in March.
Strade Bianche, Tirreno-Adriatico, and Milan-Sanremo are on Van der Poel's menu for the first time.
"That's the plan. We want to do that with the team," Van der Poel said in an interview with Dutch TV channel Ziggo Sport.
"We are not a World Tour team, so we have to get a wild card. And normally we would get a wild card."
Van der Pol said in an interview with Ziggo Sport, a Dutch television channel.
Van der Pol's latest declaration is a sign that the 2020 calendar is rapidly taking shape for the 24-year-old. With four cobbled classics on his schedule, including the Tour of Flanders and his Paris-Roubaix debut, plus a return to the Brabants Pile, which he won in 2019, his spring goals appear to be complete.
What remains unclear is where his road season will start, whether it will be a February start as in 2019, and whether he will return to defend his Amstel Gold Race title in late April. Either way, after the Classic, he will change disciplines again for the summer.
"In principle, he will rest for a while and compete in the first (mountain bike) World Cup in May," Christophe Rudhoft, team manager of the Corendon Circus, said earlier this month.
That could mean a return to the previous rounds in Nove Mesto, Czech Republic, where he won in 2019, Maribor, Slovenia, and Losinj, Croatia. Van der Pol's big goal in mountain biking is the Tokyo Olympics, where the cross-country race will take place on July 27.
"Tokyo is my big dream," he said. After that, the Grand Tour will be my new big challenge." I want to go to the Vuelta a EspaƱa."
The Corendon Circus team is looking to strengthen its roster for 2020. Stein Devolder has retired, but Christian Sbaragli of the Israel Cycling Academy is expected to sign a two-year contract, and Sacha Modolo of EF Education First is likely to join the Dutch Professional Continental team.
Others Antoine Benoist, Floris de Tia, Senne Leysen, Oscar Riesebeek, Ben Tourette, Petr Vakoc, and Louis Verweke could move to Corendon Circus for 2020.
Before returning to road racing next year, however, van der Pol has turned his attention to the World Cyclocross Championships on February 2, which he says is his only real goal for the 2019-20 cyclocross season.
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