She is beaming and looks relaxed. Anna van der Breggen is about to start her second season since her comeback. She was Olympic champion, world champion several times, sometimes she simply rode up and away from her rivals. That was in her first life as a racing cyclist. She then changed jobs, got off her bike and sat behind the wheel of the team car and only controlled the races via team radio. After three years, she had had enough of the sedentary job. On her comeback in 2025, she found a different, newer, better women's cycling sport. Which was worse for her - at least if you look at the results. However, looking back on the 2026 season, she says: "It was a good season, a nice season. I'm back at my level. It was confirmation that it was a good decision." The decision to make a comeback. The Dutchwoman is 35 years old.
World Championship silver in comeback
Although she did not string together one victory after another in her comeback year, she did manage third place overall in the Tour of Valencia right at the start. This was followed by second place in the Strade Bianche, a stage win in the Tour of Spain, sixth place in the Giro d'Italia and eleventh place in the Tour de France. And in the autumn she followed this up with medals: World Championship silver in the individual time trial and European Championship bronze in the road race. Very strong, but no longer outstanding like before. She knows herself: "I will no longer dominate the peloton." And added during a round of talks at her team SD Worx-Protime's media day before the start of the season: "Nobody is doing that at the moment - and that makes the races nice." But even at an advanced racing age, she doesn't see herself at the end of her possibilities. "I can still take small steps," she says ahead of her first race at the UAE Tour (5 to 8 February). And she emphasises that she is particularly enjoying the new challenge - the challenge that it is harder than before for her to add more victories to her 63 career successes to date: "I used to win more races. But racing is more attractive now."
More teamwork, less individual strength
In the new racing year, she is therefore taking on new challenges in races that she has mostly already won: the Trofeo Binda, where she is still one win away, the Strade Bianche (victory in 2018), the Amstel Gold Race (2017), the Flèche Wallonne (record holder with seven victories) and Liège-Bastogne-Liège (2017 and 2018). Only a few races now end up as a predictable one-woman show - since Annemiek van Vleuten's retirement and since the women's peloton has become stronger and more professional year after year, the outcome of the races has also become more open. "You need your team-mates now. The dynamics in the races have changed completely. In the past, you could always ride to the front yourself if you had good legs" - this is how she describes the change. In the past, it was all about your own strength. Now the team also has to be strong. And SD Worx-Protime is no longer the reference - others have caught up or even overtaken them. "The rest have caught up with us. The fact that so many teams are fighting on all fronts makes cycling more fun, but of course less fun for us," admits SD Worx sports director Danny Stam.
Start at Vuelta, Giro, Tour
After the spring, she obviously doesn't think she's tired yet: she wants to ride all three so-called Grand Tours. The Vuelta a Espana in May, the Giro d'Italia in June and the Tour de France in August. "It's not like when I quit four years ago. I don't expect to win a Grand Tour just like that." When she retired, the new Tour de France for women did not yet exist. And at the World Championships in Canada, the road world champion from 2018 and 2020 could play an important role in the Dutch team. Demi Vollering is the strongest compatriot to have left the SD Worx-Protime team before van der Breggen's comeback. But her Dutch team-mate at SD Worx, Lorena Wiebes, has already declared that the track in Montreal is too demanding for her and that she is therefore not planning to compete in the World Championships. This speaks in favour of the women's offensive riding style in Oranje. And van der Breggen will undoubtedly like that. However, it will be more difficult for her to win the rainbow jersey again. But she sees the big picture: "It's become more difficult, but it's good for our sport."
Andreas Kublik
Editor
