Mathieu van der Poel regrets his angry reaction when two girls kept him awake in a Sydney hotel on Saturday night. Upon arrival at Zaventem Airport near Brussels, Van der Poel admitted that he hadn’t meant it that way: “Of course, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.”
On Tuesday afternoon, the device landed from Australia in which many participants and supervisors were returning from the World Cycling Championships. Van der Poel told the camera of the Flemish channel VTM that he thinks he is wrong.
“Yes, of course I regret it. I’m wrong, I admit that. I shouldn’t have done that, I should have handled it differently. But unfortunately it did happen. I’m trying to put it behind me and now look forward to what’s to come.”
View the images made in the hotel here:
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Some girls made noise in the hallway on Saturday night and kept knocking on his hotel room door and filming it. Van der Poel, who had to participate in the World Cycling Championships the day after, became furious and chased the girls to their room.
He denies the stories that he hurt the girls. “I grabbed a girl by the arm. But certainly not with the intention of hurting her. Anyone who knows me knows that I have never hurt anyone.”
“I should have called the front desk or informed someone anyway.”
“There are a lot of stories about pushing and stuff, but that is absolutely not true. That’s not what happened,” says Van der Poel. There are two versions of the story and when you’re in Australia it’s very hard to deal with.”
Van der Poel would have acted differently afterwards. “I should have called reception or informed someone anyway. It was just getting late and I wanted to sleep. I thought I could fix it myself, but in the end it all went wrong. I can’t change it anymore, unfortunately.”
“Now I’m going home, looking for peace,” he concludes. “I am happy to be back in the country. Now the team and the lawyer will deal with it further.”