1,362 watts and 60 years: 6 surprising numbers behind Mathieu van der Poel’s Tour de France success

Mathieu van der Poel is having a stunning Tour de France even by his own high standards. 

The Alpecin-Deceuninck rider led out teammate Jasper Philipsen for the opening stage’s win before backing it up the following day, outgunning Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard with a sprint finish of his own.

His second Tour de France stage victory secured him the yellow jersey, and the 30-year-old has worn it for four out of the 2025 edition’s first seven stages. He even reclaimed it the day after dropping off the general classification’s top spot following stage five’s individual time trial.

Yet we shouldn’t be surprised by Van der Poel’s prowess. After all, he is one of the most dominant Classics riders the professional peloton has ever seen.

But how does he do it? Here are the numbers behind his success.

1.84

At 1.84m, Van der Poel is the tallest wearer of the yellow jersey in this year’s Tour de France, dwarfing teammate and stage one winner Jasper Philipsen and three-time GC champion Tadej Pogačar (both 1.76m).

6

The multi-discipline master won stage 2 of the Tour de France six weeks to the day after fracturing his scaphoid (wrist) in the UCI XCO World Cup in Nové Mesto, Czechia.

Van der Poel lined up in his first mountain bike race in almost two years at the end of May to prepare for this September’s UCI XCO World Championship in Valais, Switzerland. He is looking to add a mountain biking rainbow jersey to the seven he’s won in cyclocross and one on the road.

11

Although he only has two stage wins, Van der Poel has worn the Tour de France yellow jersey for 11 days to date in his career. 

He held it for seven consecutive days in the 2021 edition, losing it on stage eight, where he immediately quit the race to focus on mountain biking at 2021’s delayed Tokyo Olympics. 

His win at the Grand Depart of the 2022 Giro d’Italia also saw him wear the maglia rosa for the following two days.

55

Van der Poel’s win on stage 2 took his number of professional wins to 55. This includes another stage win at the Tour de France in 2021, a stage win at 2022’s Giro d’Italia and the GC at the Tour of Britain (2019). 

Although clearly handy in a Grand Tour, one-day races are his speciality and have accounted for 26 of these first places, including a UCI Road World Championship in 2023. 

He’s also won three of cycling’s five Monuments, including three consecutive Paris-Roubaix wins, three Tours of Flanders and two Milan-Sanremo victories.

60

Van der Poel’s win on stage 2 happened exactly 60 years to the day after his grandfather Raymond Poulidor won on stage 14 of the 1965 Tour de France. 

Frenchman Poulidor won seven stages during his career but is best known for being ‘the eternal second’, having finished runner-up in the Grand Tour three times to Jacques Anquetil (1964), Felice Gimondi (1965) and Eddy Merckx (1974).

Van der Poel’s cycling heritage doesn’t end with his grandfather, and his win in Boulogne-sur-Mer equalled his father Adrie’s Tour de France stage win record, which was two from 10 starts.

1,362

Van der Poel is yet to share any data from this year’s Tour de France. But the Dutchman has already shown he has an explosive, long-distance sprint finish in him, holding off Tadej Pogačar to take the win on stage 2. 

If past performances are anything to go by, he could have dropped a four-figure watt bomb to cut the cord on the chasing pack in northern France.

While he has hidden all previous rides on Strava, historic screengrabs show that in his 2021 Strade Bianche win, Van der Poel’s power peaked at 1,362 watts, while data shared by his team showed he averaged 1,004 watts for 20 seconds on Siena’s iconic Via Santa Caterina cobbled climb.