Three-time world champion Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike) is to make his cyclocross season debut after the completion of Visma-Lease a Bike’s first winter training camp on the 19th of December.
The Belgian has been recovering from an injury after a serious crash at the Vuelta a España on September 3rd forced him to end his road season early and left him unable to walk for a period of time.
Van Aert had won three stages of the Vuelta in a sensational return to form after a season hindered by injury. He crashed out on stage 16 while leading the points classification.
The Visma-Lease a Bike rider returned to training on the road on October 4th and now appears ready to prepare for a comeback to competition with a training camp in Spain coming up.
“Wout is now leaving for Spain for two and a half weeks to train,” Visma-Lease a Bike coach Jan Boven told Wielerflits.
“After that we will sit down together, but he will only start again after the first team training camp that ends on December 19.”
Van Aert’s exact date for his racing return is undetermined. Events immediately following the Visma-Lease a Bike training camp include the UCI World Cup in Hulst on 21 December, the World Cup in Zonhoven on 22 December and the World Cup in Gavere on 26 December.
Last season, Van Aert began his cyclocross campaign in Essen on the 9th of December, around two weeks earlier than his proposed start this season. A similar schedule was considered by Van Aert and the team for this year, but proved logistically impractical.
“[Starting in Essen] was also an option now, but then you only have the races in Dublin and Sardinia. Those are long journeys for one race,” Boven said.
The 30-year-old has not won the UCI cyclocross world championship since 2018, the last of his three consecutive victories. Boven did not confirm whether the world championships were on Van Aert’s schedule for this season, nor did he say how many cyclocross races Van Aert would compete in.
Meanwhile, the Belgian’s big rival, Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck), has yet to confirm whether or not he will take part in the cyclocross campaign this time around.
"Will I ride cyclocross? Maybe. If I knew, I would tell you," Van der Poel said a few weeks ago, according to Wielerflits. "We still have to decide whether or not I will ride cyclocross this winter. I am going on holiday first, then we will see."
The Dutchman, winner of six cyclocross rainbow jerseys, recently said that his focus for the next year could be on the mountain bike and has suggested that he may skip the 2025 Tour de France in order to fulfil his objective to win the XCO world title.
Last year, Van der Poel won a record-equalling sixth world cyclocross title. Afterwards he told Eurosport that he planned to set the record outright in 2025 by winning a seventh.
“I’m getting close to doing something historical and you get remembered by those kinds of things,” Van der Poel said.
“It will be a goal next year to try and break the record. It’s my first passion.”
