Van der Poel pays for strong start with collapse at MTB World Championship, dominant Hatherly defends world title
Mountain BikingSunday, 14 September 2025 at 15:20
Alan Hatherly was crowned world champion in mountain biking for the second consecutive time on Sunday in Crans-Montana, Switzerland. The South African dominated the race from start to finish, riding solo for most of the competition. Mathieu van der Poel was unable to build on his strong start and did not finish in the medals.
The World Championships in Crans Montana concluded with the men's Cross Country. On Saturday, Sweden's Jenny Rissveds won gold in the women's event. Puck Pieterse missed out on a medal, partly due to equipment failure, and had to settle for sixth place. In the men's event, Van der Poel was the Dutch hope for a podium spot.
The course, which the riders had to complete nine times, was 3.8 kilometers long and had an elevation gain of 160 meters. “It's a fair course where the strongest rider always comes out on top. The combination of elevation, climbing, and technique makes this World Championship tough, but beautiful,” said Gerben de Knegt, the Dutch national coach, describing the World Championship course.
Read more below the tweet.
Van der Poel gets off to a strong start
Van der Poel had to come from behind due to a poor starting position, but quickly moved up after the starting shot. After a few minutes, he was already in fourteenth place. Frenchman Victor Koretzky took the lead, followed by American Christopher Blevins. Reigning world champion Hatherly also got off to a flying start. He was riding in fourth position.
Van der Poel continued his advance and was already in tenth place halfway through the opening lap. He had found his rhythm and was clearly feeling good on the course. Van der Poel crossed the finish line in seventh place after the first lap in a chasing group of nine. Blevins and Koretzky were in the lead, having opened up a gap of a few seconds.
The two leaders were quickly caught in lap two. Hatherly then went on the offensive and opened up a nice gap on the rest. His mountain biking skills did not seem to have suffered from his road adventure this year with Jayco-AlUla. The South African quickly extended his lead to fifteen seconds. Van der Poel was still holding his own in the group of eight chasers.
Van der Poel drops back after Flückiger's attack
However, Van der Poel and co. did not get any closer to Hatherly. The defending world champion had picked up a good pace and continued to gain ground. The gap was already approaching half a minute in lap three. Meanwhile, the Swiss crowd pinned their hopes on Mathias Flückiger, who saw the danger and accelerated. The other chasers had no answer to that attack.
Van der Poel in particular struggled with Flückiger's acceleration. He dropped back to seventh place and lost touch with the riders battling for third place. Van der Poel's fast start seemed to have taken its toll. At the end of the first lap, he was already almost a minute behind Hatherly. The other podium places were also out of sight.
Read more below the tweet.
Flückiger, on the other hand, was making better progress. The home favorite had cut into Hatherly's lead with his acceleration. Flückiger was now within twenty seconds of the leader. However, the Swiss hopeful's advance on Hatherly seemed to stagnate towards the end of the third lap.
In the next lap, the time differences made it clear that Flückiger had overdone it with his attack. Whereas he had initially closed the gap on Hatherly, the seconds were now ticking away to his disadvantage. After lap four, Hatherly was already 45 seconds ahead of the Swiss rider, who had to pay for his efforts and was joined by four pursuers.
Read more below the tweet.
Van der Poel followed about forty seconds behind in eighth position. However, he was unable to maintain that position, let alone think about advancing. It was clear that he would no longer be in contention for a medal. Thus, he had to settle for the bronze medal he won in 2018. Van der Poel ultimately finished outside the top twenty in 29th place.
Hatherly turned it into a one-man show after his attack in the second lap. His lead grew to well over a minute, partly due to the resignation of his pursuers, who were now only concerned with the remaining podium places. Hatherly thus prolonged his world title most impressively. Simone Avondetto (Italy) and Koretzky (France) completed the podium.
Results World cross country mountain biking elite men 2025
Results powered by FirstCycling.com
Read also
IDL-productions
Preview World Mountain Bike Championships - elite men 2025 | This might be the perfect year for Mathieu van der Poel...
LIVE stage 21 Vuelta a España 2025 | A festive evening in Madrid, and one last chance for the sprinters
Course and results Vuelta a España 2025 | UAE and Vingegaard dominate, taking 10 (!) of 20 Vuelta stages
Preview GP Montreal 2025 | A crucial final rehearsal ahead of 2026!
From Sepp Kuss and Kobe Bryant to van der Poel’s golf and MTB buddy: The role models driving his MTB World Championship ambition
Latest Cycling News
🎥 Highlights MTB world championship 2025 elite men
Hatherly wins MTB world championship again despite switch to road cycling: "It was a goal from the start of this season"
Bruyneel questions whether Vingegaard and Almeida were truly sick, while Zonneveld points to Dumoulin and a "human" Pogacar
Pidcock and Vine leave Bruyneel and De Cauwer stunned in Vuelta: "He dropped Almeida!"
Niermann and Kuss admitted they already knew this morning: "We talked more about winning in red than defending the jersey"
Popular Cycling News
"Family men" Vingegaard and Pogacar support each other and call for change: "That’s very old-fashioned"
Niermann and Kuss admitted they already knew this morning: "We talked more about winning in red than defending the jersey"
Course and results Vuelta a España 2025 | UAE and Vingegaard dominate, taking 10 (!) of 20 Vuelta stages
Classifications Vuelta a España 2025 | Vingegaard, Pidcock and Riccitello have the last laugh on the Bola del Mundo
Vine hints at decisive Vuelta attack by UAE and Almeida against Vingegaard: "Final climb is just a bonus"
Latest Comments
- Roger Vlaeminck says Mads is not a good rider? Where is the headline saying you don't even have to be a good rider to win the World Road Championship says Roger Vlaeminck, who never won it!!? Perhaps his aging mind needs to think about what the heck he's saying.packfiller7103-09-2025
- Wow, there is so much criticism of the UAE XRG riders. Why so much criticism is being leveled solely at the riders is baffling. The UAE XRG management deserves a good amount of the criticism aimed at the team, as a whole. They have not managed the talent they have at all. They failed miserably to properly handle young Isaac del Toro on that penultimate day of the Giro. And they have not handled Juan Ayuso well either. If they didn't have Tadej Pogacar in their roster, we might not be talking about them as winners, at all. So many think that Ayuso has shown that he is not a "team" player at all. Does anybody think that he might be thinking about his own future at this point? That he might want to feel like the team has his back, when they load the pressure onto him? And Joao is not a team leader. That burden might be laid on him by the management, but they need to properly support that assignment, not make it a contentious situation, within the team. And then how management has conducted themselves throughout this parting of ways between themselves and Ayuso has been totally indiscreet. And yet people want to pile onto Ayuso when he tells the truth about the manner that this is all soap opera is developing. He wants out. He shouldn't be getting so much negative criticism for that. It's a situation that has soured. Yes he has a contract, but he is not the first, nor will he be the last that wants to get out of a relationship that just isn't working anymore. And DeCauwer seems to have very vague reasons for criticizing Almeida. He does realize that Jonas is the second best Grand Tour rider of this current generation, so it should be no shame that Joao is behind him in the standings. Riders are giving their all in an extremely difficult sport that stretches them, often beyond their limits. Now many are wanting to send them to Behavioral School as well? The criticism ought to mellow out, or it ought to simply be ignored, as nothing more than blah, blah, blah, not worth the headlines it gets
reemmo002-09-2025 - In 5yrs, Pogi will be a top Twitch streamer living on baked goods while Urska is still racing.Veganpotter11-08-2025
- All they learned is that at the end of a 3 week race, Wout can beat him on a slightly bumpy stage. Obviously, this is very much thanks to Wout not racing for GC every day. This doesn't teach them a thing for Jonas beating Pogi. Not saying Jonas will never beat him again. But this absolutely won't have anything to do with it if he does beat him.Veganpotter28-07-2025
- Well, he eventually Pogacar pays the price for his insane spring campaign which was really crazyRosenkohl196125-07-2025
- Maybe I was a bit disrespectful to Heiden. What he did was unique and exceptional but he wasn't the only one who combined those distances, nowadays it is just not possible and nobody competes in both distances. The same is true for cycling with for example the combination of Roubaix and de Tour de France. In Merckx era there were more riders who managed a top10 in both races than currently.Joostmehrtens19-06-2025
- Two old men shouting at pigeons in the park…JonS16-06-2025
- Out of touch old men hankering after their youth through rose tinted spectacles, their arrogance almost outshines their irrelevance. Turn the volume down, this modern stuff just isn't music like we used to sing...johnny20whales16-06-2025
- In talking speed skating, the days when Heiden did that, nobody else did that. And Eddy couldn't do the equivalent of the bike. His 200 on the velodrome was good, but not world competitive for gold. Heiden was in his own world on the ice, moreso than Eddy if we pretend Eric didn't have a very short career on the ice.Veganpotter16-06-2025
- They wouldn't have dropped HIM so easily.... the GOAT. They would have dropped the rest from that era easily thoughVeganpotter16-06-2025
Loading
