David van der Poel: the rider who never really stepped
The fact that the van der Poel family is a true cycling family hardly needs further explanation. David van der Poel was born on June 15, 1992, as the son of former world cyclo-cross champion Adrie van der Poel and the grandson of Raymond Poulidor. From an early age, it was clear that the Belgium-born Dutchman’s cycling genes were more than adequate…
Many honorary finishes characterize David van der Poel’s career
Just like Mathieu (more on him later), David is an extremely talented and gifted cyclo-cross rider. David wasn’t necessarily a frequent winner, but he was someone who could regularly compete with the best in the race. For instance, in the 2009-2010 cyclo-cross season, David managed to become the Dutch national cyclo-cross champion, something he repeated in 2012-2013 among the under-23 category. In 2010, he also added the overall victory in the Cyclo-cross World Cup for juniors to his list of achievements.
David was not only a cyclo-cross rider, as the scion of the cycling family also participated in various road races from a young age. In 2011, he joined the formation of BKCP-Powerplus, a Continental cycling brigade under the guidance of the Roodhooft brothers. This team was both a cyclo-cross team and a road cycling team, with riders such as Gianni Vermeersch, Niels Albert and Philipp Walsleben among its ranks. In his debut year, David participated in several second-tier races and generally finished in the middle of the pack, likely with the cyclo-cross season in mind.
