{"id":589838,"date":"2026-04-06T20:57:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T20:57:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/589838\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T20:57:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T20:57:10","slug":"do-you-have-something-for-cramps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/589838\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cDo you have something for cramps?\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>The exchange came just before the race moved onto the final sequence of climbs, where Pogacar would ultimately make the winning difference on the Oude Kwaremont.<\/p>\n<p>At that point, Van der Poel was still firmly in contention, riding alongside Pogacar, Remco Evenepoel and Wout van Aert as the group of favourites began to splinter under pressure.<\/p>\n<p>The request raised immediate questions. Was this the first sign of a physical issue, or simply a rider managing the effort in a race where the intensity had been high from a long way out?&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMathieu thought he might get cramps\u201dAlpecin sports director <a href=\"https:\/\/cyclinguptodate.com\/christoph-roodhoft\" title=\"Christoph Roodhooft\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Christoph Roodhooft<\/a> offered a brief insight after the finish, though even he stopped short of confirming the extent of the issue, <a href=\"https:\/\/sporza.be\/nl\/2026\/04\/05\/-heb-je-iets-tegen-krampen-voorspelde-dit-moment-dat-mathieu-van-der-poel-zou-kraken-in-titanenduel~1775398385644\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">telling Sporza the exchange had been minimal.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cNot much, actually. It only lasted a very short time. Was it about cramps? Ah, so you already know that,\u201d he said. \u201cMathieu thought he might get cramps, but I still haven\u2019t spoken to him.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That uncertainty only added to the ambiguity around the moment, with no clear indication of whether it developed into a real problem.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"280\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/mathieu-van-der-poel-69d3a4452043e.jpg@webp.webp\" class=\"w-auto h-auto\" alt=\"Mathieu van der Poel at the 2026 Tour of Flanders\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Mathieu van der Poel at the 2026 Tour of Flanders<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEveryone was on the limit\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Van der Poel himself was quick to downplay the suggestion that cramps had played a decisive role in the outcome. \u201cNot really. Everyone was on the limit, and so was I \u2014 that was more the case,\u201d he said after the finish. \u201cI tried everything I could.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Those words aligned with what played out on the road. When Pogacar launched his decisive move on the final ascent of the Oude Kwaremont, Van der Poel was the only rider able to follow initially, holding the wheel before eventually being distanced.<\/p>\n<p>From there, he rode to second place behind the Slovenian, once again emerging as Pogacar\u2019s closest challenger in a Monument.<\/p>\n<p>Perspective after another podium<\/p>\n<p>Within the Alpecin camp, the focus after the finish was not on what might have gone wrong, but on the level Van der Poel had shown across the race. \u201cThat Kwaremont is decisive because it is the longest climb in the race. On the other climbs, things were going particularly quickly,\u201d Roodhooft said. \u201cWe can go to Roubaix with confidence, which is still a very good opportunity. Mathieu finished second today after a fantastic race, and we must not forget that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the end, the brief radio exchange remained just that, a moment within a much larger story. Van der Poel was close enough to ask the question, but strong enough to still finish second in one of the hardest editions of the <a href=\"https:\/\/cyclinguptodate.com\/tour-des-flandres\" title=\"Tour of Flanders\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Tour of Flanders<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"&#13; The exchange came just before the race moved onto the final sequence of climbs, where Pogacar would&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":589839,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[221189,64,63,169409,784,77973,85,167262],"class_list":["post-589838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-alpecin-premier-tech","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-christoph-roodhooft","tag-cycling","tag-mathieu-van-der-poel","tag-sports","tag-tour-of-flanders"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=589838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/589838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/589839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=589838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=589838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=589838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}