Mathieu van der Poel narrowly avoided a pre-season disaster in training at the weekend, almost crashing as he sprinted against an amateur but miraculously managing to keep his bike up.
With the cameras rolling, an Instagram video posted by Anatole Leboucher – who will ride for Continental team Veloce Club Rouen 76 in 2026 and offered up the playful challenge to the Dutch star – shows an initial sprint by Van der Poel abandoned after his back wheel lifted off the ground and he dropped his chain.
Captured by amateur teammate Léo David, who has raced with Leboucher for the past season on UC Cholet 49, the pair of French riders were also with another former world champion, Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor), when the incident occurred.
The video has already amassed more than 250,000 views at the time of writing, with Leboucher also detailing his day sprinting against the former world champion.
“I wanted to catch up with them, and once I was with them, I took the liberty of asking Van der Poel if he was okay with doing a few sprints with me,” Leboucher told DirectVelo. “I told Mathieu I wanted him to give 100%, there was no point in him faking it, and he was clearly fired up.
“We watched the video afterwards and he was still laughing. I would have felt terrible if he had crashed and it had ruined his upcoming cyclocross goals. It wouldn’t have been directly my fault, but I was the one who suggested he sprint.”
Leboucher and Van der Poel didn’t tempt fate with another sprint attempt, but the Frenchman was back out on the roads with more pros a day later, sprinting against compatriot Paul Magnier (Soudal-QuickStep).
Van der Poel has been training in Spain for several weeks over the winter as he prepares to kick off his cyclocross season this Sunday in Namur, with a 13-race calendar planned until he takes aim at a record eighth CX world title in Hulst.
He’ll then kick off his road season in the spring with Alpecin-Premier Tech, after the Canadian company was announced as their new title sponsor last Friday.