Van der Poel breaks Barguil's Strava record for 50-minute Alpine climb | Sticky Bottle

*Mathieu van der Poel, far right, went for broke on the final day of his team's altitude camp in the Alps*

Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix) has broken the Strava record on a 23km Alpine climb that was previously held by Warren Barguil (Arkéa-Samsic).

The Dutch rider
was at an altitude camp at La Plagne and tackled the Col du Petit Saint-Bernard in the Alps with his team mates on the last day of
the camp.

Three of the
group beat Barguil’s time from three years ago by five minutes, with Van der
Poel the fastest.

He rode the 23.88km ascent in a time of 51:19, which easily beat Barguil’s time of 56:46. Louis Vervaeke and Floris de Tier were with Van der Poel; Vervaeke just two seconds slower than his team leader and de Tier 1:22 slower.

*Mathieu van der Poel's data for his full training ride on the last day of the altitude camp*

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Van der Poel pumped out an
average 379 watts for his effort up the climb and appears in good shape ahead
of the resumption of hostilities in pro cycling in the coming weeks.

The 25-year-old won Amstel
Gold last year along with the Tour of Britain, De Brabantse Pijl and Dwars
door Vlaanderen, among other races.

He had been due to re-start his 2020 season at Sibiu Tour in Romania, though his team pulled out due to a spike in Covid19 cases
there.

He is provisionally due to ride many of the major one-day
races on the revised calendar including Strade Bianche, Milano-Sanremo, Il
Lombardia, La Flèche Wallonne, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, Amstel Gold Race, Tour of
Flanders and Paris-Roubaix.