Wout van Aert and Marianne Vos triumph in green in post-Tour de France criterium
Tour stars Van Vleuten, Thomas, Philipsen, Pidcock take part in Dutch and Belgian crits
The cycling calendar might have swiftly moved on following the Tour de France and Tour de France Femmes, but the stars of the big July races are still enjoying themselves at the traditional criteriums that follow the Tour.
Elsewhere, the peloton has moved on to the Tour de Pologne and Vuelta a Burgos as the calendar points ahead to the Vuelta a España and World Championships. However, the likes of Wout van Aert, Marianne Vos, Annemiek van Vleuten, and Mathieu van der Poel have been racing at the Roosendaal criterium in the Netherlands.
Stars of the men's and women's Tours partnered up in a two-person time trial on Monday, with Jumbo-Visma's green jersey winners Van Aert and Vos taking a victory there to go with the five they racked up in July.
Dutch Trek-Segafredo duo Ellen van Dijk and Bauke Mollema took second place while Van der Poel and Tour winner Van Vleuten rounded out the podium at what would have been a lucrative day of not-so-serious racing.
Van Vleuten, who won the inaugural women's Tour by 3:48 after dominating the final two mountain stages, added to her hefty 2022 win list – albeit unofficially – after beating Vos and Tour white jersey winner Shirin van Anrooij.
In the men's criterium race it was Van Aert who came out on top a week after rolling down the Champs-Elysées in green alongside teammate and Tour winner Jonas Vingegaard.
The Belgian, who won in Calais, Lausanne, and Rocamador last month, beat stage 2 winner Fabio Jakobsen, and Van der Poel in the Roosendaal sprint.
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There'll be more criterium racing to come as the stars of the Tour cash in on appearances following their time in France. Indeed, Roosendaal isn't the first of the post-Tour crits, with Van Aert, Yves Lampaert, Tiesj Benoot, and L'Alpe d'Huez winner Tom Pidcock among those who took part in Roeselare last week.
Elsewhere, Jasper Philipsen has taken wins in Aalst and Putte, with Geraint Thomas and Michael Matthews also among the riders taking part in the series of criteriums.
Dani Ostanek is Senior News Writer at Cyclingnews, having joined in 2017 as a freelance contributor and later being hired full-time. Before joining the team, she had written for numerous major publications in the cycling world, including CyclingWeekly and Rouleur. She writes and edits at Cyclingnews as well as running newsletter, social media, and how to watch campaigns.