Winning Paris-Roubaix for the third consecutive year, the Dutchman cemented his status not just as the modern king of the cobbles, but as one of the very best one-day riders the sport has ever seen. His win in the 2025 edition of the “Hell of the North” was historic not just for the drama on the road, but for the sheer volume of statistical milestones it has eitherconfirmed or created.
Van der Poel has now raced Paris-Roubaix five times. He has won three of those editions. That’s a win rate of 60% (!), outrageous consistency in a race where even the favourites often crash out or lose time due to punctures and mechanical issues
Mountain bike riders risk it all in the pursuit of glory at Red Bull Cerro…
Let’s break them down, and see why this hat-trick is already being called one of the greatest achievements in modern cycling.
Read also
UCI President David Lappartient discusses plans for 2027 ‘super’ World Championships: “When I first came up with this idea, no one was convinced”
UCI President David Lappartient discusses plans for 2027 ‘super’ World Championships: “When I first came up with this idea, no one was convinced”
Only two riders in history had ever won Paris-Roubaix three times in a row: Octave Lapize in 1909, 1910, and 1911, and Francesco Moser in 1978, 1979, and 1980. Van der Poel now joins that exclusive club with back-to-back wins in 2023, 2024, and 2025.
In the modern era, with deeper fields, better preparation, and even more unpredictable racing, achieving three consecutive wins in the same Monument is almost unthinkable. But Van der Poel has done it. Not just any Monument either, but Paris-Roubaix, the most unpredictable and brutal of them all. He becomes the third rider ever to achieve this triple, and the first in 45 years
His worst finish? Ninth place in 2022. That’s the only time he has finished outside the top three in this race, and in fact, it was also the last time he failed to podium in a cobbled Monument of any kind. There is simply no one else doing what Van der Poel is doing over the pavé.
Perhaps even more impressively, Mathieu van der Poel is now the only rider in history to have won a cobbled Monument in four consecutive seasons, according to Cycling Statistics. His winning streak includes the Tour of Flanders in 2022, Paris-Roubaix in 2023, Tour of Flanders again in 2024, followed by Paris-Roubaix in both 2024 and 2025.
That’s five cobbled Monument wins in four years, something no rider has ever achieved. Not Merckx, not Boonen, not Cancellara. He is, quite simply, the undisputed king of the cobbles.
This year’s result also delivered something that has never happened before: the same three riders stood on the podium at both the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix in the same season. At Flanders, it was Tadej Pogacar first, Mads Pedersen second, and Van der Poel third. A week later, on the brutal roads of northern France, the Dutchman turned the tables, Van der Poel won, ahead of Pogacar and Pedersen. Meanwhile, Wout van Aert finished fourth in both races, highlighting just how consistent the top tier of one-day racing has become.
With this victory, Mathieu van der Poel now owns eight Monument titles. Those are three Paris-Roubaix wins in 2023, 2024 and 2025, three Tour of Flanders wins in 2020, 2022 and 2024, and two Milano-Sanremo wins in 2023 and 2025. That places him ahead of Tom Boonen in terms of total Monument wins. And that’s significant, but why?
