Mathieu van der Poel and his 1,000-day Whoop streak: why the wristband matters so much to him

Mathieu van der Poel has shared on Instagram that he has reached a Whoop streak of 1,000. That means the Alpecin-Premier Tech rider has worn the wearable tracking his health data every single day for 1,000 consecutive days. Van der Poel is currently racing the Tour de Suisse. But what does 1,000 days of data actually mean for the Dutchman?

Van der Poel posted a screenshot on social media showing he has reached the 1,000-day Whoop streak. Since 22 September 2023 — six days after he wrapped up his road racing season that year — he has worn his Whoop every day without interruption.

A Whoop is a screenless wristband that measures data such as heart rate, HRV and the like — via a wristband rather than a watch such as an Apple Watch or Garmin. Van der Poel is also a partner of the Boston-based company, alongside the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Virgil van Dijk, LeBron James, Michael Phelps, Charles Leclerc and Tadej Pogačar.

Van der Poel has spoken before about how he uses Whoop. Earlier this year, he was a guest on the company's podcast. "HRV and resting heart rate are the two most important numbers I watch," he said. "The average is 38. The lowest I have on Whoop recorded is 34. So it's really low."

"I'm really high in HRV," he also said of that metric, which in his case is over 200 — extraordinarily high. HRV (heart rate variability) is a measure that gives insight into stress and fatigue. "I think it's a bit genetical, but fitness is important also. For sure, it's something that makes me stronger and better recovered," he explained.

Based on your sleep and other recovery data, Whoop also calculates how ready you are to train. "If you are in the red, you want to get back to the green as fast as possible. The data from Whoop helps me to support my feeling," Van der Poel said on this.

A fun fact: when Van der Poel won Paris-Roubaix in 2023, he could see from his Whoop data that the celebrations afterwards had taken quite a toll. His longest night of that year came after the Roubaix afterparty, at 9 hours and 35 minutes.