\nTraining with Van der Poel and the mindset shift between spring and the Tour<\/p>\n
Philipsen described how riding with Van der Poel continues to elevate him in winter preparation, crediting their shared competitiveness for keeping standards high. \u201cIn Spain is it easy to train a lot,\u201d he told Het Nieuwsblad. \u201cThe weather is good, the company is good. I get very motivated from training together and having fun. Sometimes it becomes competitive. One of us starts riding half a wheel ahead, the other joins in and before you know it, the game is on and we are rotating turns.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Belgian also acknowledged how difficult it is to switch from Classics conditioning to sprint-specific work once spring is over. \u201cAs a sprinter you have to train either very easy or very hard,\u201d he explained. \u201cWhen you train black-and-white like that, you have to do more of your own thing. As a sprinter you have to guard much more carefully what you are doing. Whereas I actually enjoy the social aspect most of all.\u201d<\/p>\n
Roubaix obsession and the emotional pull of the velodrome<\/p>\n
Philipsen did not hide the scale of his ambition for Paris-Roubaix, a race he has already finished second in twice \u2014 and one he considers central to his identity.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a race I really live for, that I am passionate about, and even get emotional thinking about,\u201d he said. \u201cFor races like Paris-Roubaix I started cycling. They match my DNA and the team\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n
The preparation, he says, is built around having a clear purpose. \u201cTo get up and put on your training kit every morning, you need a perspective \u2014 otherwise it becomes difficult. For races like that, I do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
From Lille glory to Tour heartbreak and Vuelta redemption<\/p>\n
Philipsen admitted that the dream start to the Tour \u2014 winning stage one and taking yellow \u2014 made the sudden crash in stage three especially hard to process.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was in a lot of pain and full of painkillers, so I remember little of those first hours,\u201d he recalled. \u201cThe next day I woke up watching the race on TV \u2014 a race where I still had many goals. You think: that is where I should be. That is very hard.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yet even after surgery and a narrow recovery window, Philipsen still managed to win the opening stage of the Vuelta and three stages in total. \u201cYou start thinking about goals and then you end up with that opening stage and the red jersey,\u201d he said. \u201cAgain I had a very strong team around me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Looking ahead with a renewed purpose<\/p>\n
Philipsen is already shaping his approach to 2026, with his partnership with Van der Poel, his Roubaix target and a sharpened sprint focus all guiding his winter.<\/p>\n
And whatever the setbacks, he remains confident in the foundations behind him. \u201cWe have a culture of building towards those races,\u201d he said. \u201cI think Mathieu and I motivate each other very strongly.\u201d<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Training with Van der Poel and the mindset shift between spring and the Tour Philipsen described how…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":321667,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[13947,49,48,635,55552,13633,58563,82,636],"class_list":["post-321666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-alpecin-deceuninck","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-jasper-philipsen","tag-mathieu-van-der-poel","tag-paris-roubaix","tag-sports","tag-tour-de-france"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321666\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/321667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}