{"id":693538,"date":"2026-05-25T13:05:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T13:05:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/693538\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T13:05:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T13:05:10","slug":"its-good-for-the-sport-that-mathieu-is-joining-in-alan-hatherly-welcomes-van-der-poels-mtb-ambitions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/693538\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;It\u2019s good for the sport that Mathieu is joining in&#8221;: Alan Hatherly welcomes Van der Poel&#8217;s MTB ambitions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&#13;<\/p>\n<p>This year, he has continued improving, securing sixth in the Tirreno-Adriatico time trial and third overall at Coppi e Bartali before heading to the Giro. For Hatherly, the move to the road was basically mandatory in order to avoid stagnation.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It was mainly a matter of stepping out of my comfort zone,&#8221; Hatherly explained in an interview to In de Leiderstrui. &#8220;I&#8217;ve spent my entire career mostly mountain biking, so at a certain point, I started asking myself what I needed to do to take another step forward. The most logical move for me was to try it on the road. So far, I&#8217;m really enjoying the process.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>His absence from the mountain bike scene won&#8217;t last long, though. As soon as the Giro wraps up, the South African will switch bikes immediately to prepare for his next big objective. &#8220;After the Giro, I will immediately focus on mountain biking again, hoping to defend my world title in Val di Sole. After that, I\u2019ll return to the road, but I find it a very fun switch. The way I\u2019m approaching it now constantly provides fresh energy. If you do just one discipline all year round, I don\u2019t know if you keep the fire burning.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"720\" height=\"405\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/alanhatherly-675778333369f.jpg@webp.webp\" class=\"w-auto h-auto\" alt=\"alanhatherly\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Hatherly won the MTB World Championships in 2024 and 2025<\/p>\n<p>The reality of the multi-discipline compromise<\/p>\n<p>When Hatherly arrives at the World Championships later this year, he will likely cross paths with Mathieu van der Poel, who is still chasing an elusive elite mountain bike world title. Hatherly welcomes the road superstar&#8217;s presence but acknowledges that Van der Poel faces the same steep uphill battle he does when trying to conquer both worlds.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It\u2019s good for the sport that Mathieu is joining in and genuinely has goals here. I think he views it similarly to how I do: you\u2019re looking for challenges for yourself and trying to grow,&#8221; Hatherly analyzed. &#8220;The combination suits him well, but the MTB Worlds haven&#8217;t been very fruitful for him so far. If luck is a bit more on his side, it could easily happen.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>However, Hatherly was quick to point out that even for a talent like Van der Poel, splitting focus always comes at a cost. &#8220;His primary focus is now on the road and he takes on mountain biking alongside it, but if you want to be successful, you have to make choices somewhere. I also notice that it is difficult to be tip-top at both; you are always making a compromise somewhere.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"&#13; This year, he has continued improving, securing sixth in the Tirreno-Adriatico time trial and third overall at&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":693539,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[185857,64,63,784,163619,77973,85,51866],"class_list":["post-693538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-alan-hatherly","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-giro-ditalia","tag-mathieu-van-der-poel","tag-sports","tag-team-jayco-alula"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/693538","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=693538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/693538\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/693539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=693538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=693538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=693538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}