Van Der Breggen Targets Major Wins in Second Year of Comeback
Anna van der Breggen is in the second year of her comeback to the sport. With confidence boosted by her return, and with a feeling of progress being made, she is daring to dream of something huge: the third world championship win of her career.
“Last year it was a bit of a look at how it would go and if I could go well,” she said in recent days. “That was very good.”
“I now notice that the endurance and intensity are back. and I now know what to expect,so I’m already starting the season very differently than last year. Now it’s just see if I can do better.”
Van der Breggen is one of cycling’s best-ever riders, taking 63 wins across her career. These include the Olympic games road race, two world championships, two editions of the Giro d’Italia Internazionale Femminile and a staggering seven straight wins in Flèche Wallonne.
Though she retired from the sport back in September 2021. She was mentally and physically fatigued, and so her later decision to return three and half years after her retirement stunned many.
The 2025 season was her first back in the bunch and while she wasn’t as dominant as before, she racked up some very respectable results. She won a tactically-brilliant stage of the Vuelta España Femenina and finished third overall. She was also second on a stage of the Giro d’Italia Women and in Strade Bianche Donne, and third overall in the Setmana ciclista Volta Femenina de la Comunitat Valenciana.
She then finished the season off on a high note, taking second to Marlen Reusser in the TT at the world championships and third in the road race at the Europeans.
Now it’s year two, and there are reasons for optimism about what is in store.