Flow caught up with newly crowned XCE World Champion Paul Van Der Ploeg at Durban airport as he prepared to fly home to Victoria via god-knows-where – “I’ve got like a 27 hour flight home. I was a bit of a tight arse because Worlds was costing me so much that I just booked the cheapest flight I could.”
Anyone who has ever crossed paths with this amicable giant of a man will know that he’s one of the true characters of Australian mountain biking – a smiling, hilarious, unassuming fella. For us here at Flow, seeing Paul don the World Championship stripes was a golden moment. Congratulations, you mad big unit!
If you haven’t yet seen Paul Van Der Ploeg’s World Champs race, open the link below and skip to around the 1 hour 49 minute mark – try and keep the grin off your face!
So, Paul, how does it feel?
Well, I don’t know. Straight after was pretty crazy, quite overwhelmeing. Standing on the World Championships poudium I was just like, ‘is this happening? What is happening here?’ Because I’d always planned on coming over to Worlds, but it wasn’t really the major focus of the year.
It was all done so last minute because the Worlds team is chosen so late, and I was already locked into racing the Tour of Borneo.
Compared to last year the pressure was so much lighter, there was no weight on my shoulders. I didn’t perceive that I would have what it’d take to win, so I was just hoping that I wouldn’t make an idiot of myself and would progress through the qualifying.
Have you watched the race back again? Because the Red Bull TV commentators certainly thought you were going to win it from the outset.
I watched like the last six minutes on my phone when I’d just left my passport and my Worlds jersey in a rental car after we dropped them back at Durban airport! I was just watching it on my little phone in the back of a cab and this dude had massive loud Indian music cranking so I had my headphones in. It was pretty surreal and I was so nervous, even watching it back and knowing the outcome, I was still nervous! I was almost as nervous watching it on the replay as I was on the race day! I remember thinking to myself, I can’t imagine what it’d be like watching from a couch in Australia!
Your inside line in the semis was freaking unreal!
I think it would’ve been cool to see an angle from behind. The ground was all covered with loose dirt and sticks and it was a really awkward right hand turn, that’s why people were coming at it a little slower.
I was panicking in the semi final after the Italian and the other dudes just completely chopped my guts out. I was like, ‘what is happening?! I’ve just gone from first to third and I’m not going to make the final!’ So it was make or break so I just laid it on the line. There could’ve been a big hole or something in the rough there, but it worked!
I can’t believe you were able to do it again in the final!
Yeah, and I had a shitbox start in the final too. I was nervous. If they’d had the camera on me in the minutes leading up to the final they would’ve see me literally twitching!
The start line was a laser beam, and if you cross the beam you get disqualified – there are no second chances. One false start, you’re out. In the final I’d crept forward too far so I was packing it about cross the beam, and I was freaking out. And then the gun went! Fiedespiel got this mad start and I was just scrambling to get on his wheel!
I’d told Chris Clarke before the start that I was going inside again. It was no secret, everyone had seen it in the semis, and they could try to shut it down if they wanted. It was going to work, or it wasn’t, but that was there I was going!
In the time trial I hit that corner so fast and I washed out both tyres. I was running these Schwalbe Thunderbirds that are practically a semi-slick, but they’re ridiculously fast. Anyhow in the time trial I had a little too much pressure and I slid and had to clip out. So I was just totally panicking! There was nothing calm or composed about the time trial!
After the race I totally lost my shit, obviously. I hadn’t backed myself to be able to do, it hadn’t put any pressure on myself. Neil Ross, who has been coaching me, he said he made sure no one knew I was in good form so no one would be putting pressure on me. I thought that was pretty funny because I didn’t even know I was in good form either! It works out better when I don’t think I’m in good form, because it means I don’t give a shit and I’m just riding and having fun.
It was a super cool week with the whole Aussie team. I was kind of like an elder statesman in the team, which was really weird for me! I don’t think of myself as mature in any way, shape or form! But the juniors were looking up to me as some kind of elite, wise rider!
“It works out better when I don’t think I’m in good form, because it means I don’t give a shit and I’m just riding and having fun.”
The day before the junior race I did a full lap with Holly Harris, which was really cool. We stopped a lot and talked about the different technical sections. It was cool, on the Corkscrew, all the other juniors were running this shitty outside line and almost crashing, but I convinced Holly to do the drop, and none of the other junior women were doing it. She was super satisfied and it was really rewarding for me too. It really helped to keep me distracted during the week.
After I pulled out of the cross country I had a realisation that ‘shit, I better actually do my job tomorrow, I better pull my finger out!’ It wasn’t up until the morning of the Eliminator that I started to get nervous. And the main thing that had me worried was the qualifying time trial – there was like 140 riders and only 32 go through. One mistake in the time trial and you can be out! I think the times of the people who qualified were all between 1 min 47, and 1 minute 53! It was super tight. It was really stressful, especially for me because I renowned for getting really nervous and forgetting how to ride in the time trial.
So when did you realise that you could actually win this thing?
After that inside move I was just focused on riding the course smooth. And that rock garden, I’d seen a lot of people crash on it because our team tent was right opposite it. I was just trying to block out all those crashes I’d seen and ride my line.
Near the top of the pinch climb, Bec Henderson was beside the course and she was screaming at me, ‘Paul, you’ve got this! Don’t look back, just go!’ And if you watch the race, I don’t look back once. I was concentrating on the final sprint, making sure I was were I wanted to be because there was only one really smooth line in the final straight. I wanted to make sure that if there was a sprint, he would’ve had to come round me in the rough or on the fence.
Your finish line celebrations were great to watch. Who was there on the finish line?
That was the cool thing – it was all the junior downhill guys. It was one of those cool weeks were there were no barriers, all the team meshed across the different disciplines. All the downhill boys hanging out with the cross-country boys, there was no segregation.
I think it was Dean Lucas who I just grabbed the flag off, and then I turned around and accidentally fully shoulder barged Federspiel! And how disrespectful was it that I fully ghostied my bike?! I wasn’t even thinking! I hope Giant don’t mind!
We saw some photos of Caroline Buchanan helping you with your starts.
Yeah, it was awesome having her there. She gave me a five minute crash course, and I think I learnt everything that I know in that five minutes! I didn’t know what I was doing previously. There is a lot of technique to getting out of the gate fast, it’s not just power, and I got it right a few times and stuffed if up a few too. She is a great teacher – she didn’t heap on too many teaching points, just a few basics. She taught me a lot about how to defend my position too, which definitely came in handy – ‘This is my line, and you are not taking it!’
You’ve had a pretty crazy year, racing all kinds of different disciplines, and some injuries too.
My year started with a shoulder reconstruction for my right shoulder that kept dislocating. I managed to ignore pretty much everything the surgeon said though, and just start riding my bike straight away. I was back on the road bike within four weeks, mountain bike in six. It was meant to be a 15-week recovery.
I had a good Nationals series, and did well in the Otway Odyssey too, which was good to show people that I’m not just a sprint specialist. I raced the CX Nationals too and had a lot of fun. After National Series and Champs I went and did my first official road tour with Giant at the Tour of Thailand.
….just quickly, how much bigger than the rest of peloton were you?
Ha, yeah, head and shoulders. I was also propped up quite high at the front on my road bike because of my mountain bike background, so I could kind of see over the whole peloton.
Straight after Thailand I went to Perth were I had a crash at 70km/h and snapped my right collarbone, which was not ideal, being the same side I’d just had surgery on. It was a big crash, I was sliding down the road for long enough that I had time to think, ‘ok, this has stopped being fun, I’d like to stop sliding now.’ I went to jump back on but discovered quickly that there was no seat attached to my bike, and then I felt the pain in my collarbone.
I went to the orthopaedic surgeon the next week and asked him if I could ride my bike. He said, ‘no’ and I went ‘well, I just rode the 30 kay here.’ So he let me ride.
Have you got serious plans for the road?
Well, I’m not taking anything too seriously, and it seems to be working, so I’ll probably just keep doing that.
Nah, I’m not sure. The Tour of Borneo was awesome. I won the first stage and after that it was just riding for fun. It was the first time that I’ve been exposed to some pretty blatant doping – there were no drug controls at Borneo and it became pretty obvious that some riders were not clean. It was very confronting and a bit depressing.
In the last day in Borneo I ate something that didn’t agree with me, and on the first flight to South Africa I just exploded out of both ends. It was pretty bad, on the toilet, leaning over to the basin! I checked myself into a clinic at Kuala Lumpur airport, and they had me on IV fluids and anti-vomiting meds. I passed out at the gate, and when I was checking in. I was so close to booking a flight home to Australia. I thought there was no way I could recover, I was totally buckled, couldn’t even function and completely alone.
By the time I got to Abu Dhabi I was little better, then when I got to Johannesburg I was more of a human. I’m glad I didn’t just head home.
What’s next then?
Everyone’s asking if I’ll race the World Cups next year, and I think that to have the rainbow stripes and not capitalising would be pretty stupid. I mean, I could go race on the road at some low level, or race at highest level of mountain biking on a World Cup team with World Champs stripes.
Any ideas what will happen on the team front?
I’m definitely staying with Giant. It’s such a big company and there are so many opportunities, I’d be retarded to change teams now. Actually, I’m not really on a team, which has been awesome. It’s meant I can do pretty much whatever races I want, a totally random schedule, and there’s not a team out there that could support that. The guys at Giant are awesome, they’ve been amazing. I mean, they signed me knowing full well that I was going in for shoulder surgery and could potentially be out for months. But they just said, ‘we know you’re a good rider, just get your shit sorted and things will be fine.’ And having that relaxed, no pressure, non-results-based setup has been something I’ve thrived off.
Go get your plane mate! We’ll see you in Australia.