My story
Mats is injured and it’s the second serious injury he has had in his cycling career. In late February 2024, he is sitting at home, with his family, and we have ample time to chat about his life on the bike so far. Mats is now racing for the development team of Lidl-Trek, after having spent 3 years with Leopard, a Luxembourg-based continental team. Even though he theoretically races in the same categories as with Leopard, the big difference is that he can now train with the pros (the likes of Mads Pedersen) and may also take part in races above the continental level (but no world tour races yet, like The Tour de France).
Fast-rewind: Mats started his cycling career with a club in Schifflange, in the south of Luxembourg. His parents’ home being quite a distance from Schifflange, joining the club also had the advantage of a weekly visit to the grand-parents or his father’s parents who still live in the area today. Training was on Tuesdays only, at the beginning, and later sometimes on Saturdays. At that point, racing was still a game for Mats. Mountain biking was his first love until he turned about 15. This comes as no surprise for those that know the Red Rock area near Schifflange. When he turned 10, Mats took part in his first competitions, mostly on the road bike, some off-road…. At the beginning, he rarely won because at this point being one of the youngest of his age-group and surely also not one of the tallest, he had a big disadvantage compared to other riders. Once he moved up to older categories (13-15 year-olds), he could then hold off the best, and win his first competitions on the mountain bike at the age of 13.
By this time, he had changed to a club closer to his home, the Tooltime Préizerdaul. It was during this period that Mats really got into cycling! With a bunch of friends, they slept at each other’s places and went biking all weekend or during school holidays. If they stopped to have a break ("active" breaks like playing football were very popular), someone had to spin the wheels on the bikes in order to accumulate the necessary distance they needed as proof for their seriousness in training.
Friendships foster team spirit and this has always played an important role for Mats, even if the notion of team spirit only gained more relevance as he got older and competed in categories such as the juniors. Nonetheless, at this time, Mats made friends that are nowadays best training mates, who accompany him on his training rides no matter the weather. Racing with friends, like for the Luxembourgish national teams of all youth categories, taught Mats a lot about what role riders in races have to play, from being the leader or the road captain to being a domestique (e.g. getting water bottles from the team car or protecting the strongest in the team). Once Mats went for his first altitude camps, it was usually with his friends from the Luxembourgish national teams, like in 2022, to prepare the prestigious Tour de l’Avenir (Mats was 19th in the overall final ranking, in the latter years 2023 and 2024, he largely improved on these rankings).
After a short stay with Tooltime, Mats changed clubs again, and joined the newly created Atertdaul Cycling Team in Rédange, where his father Pascal gradually took over the role of trainer and manager. However, with the recent move to Lidl-Trek Pascal has had to completely withdraw from this role. Cycling is a sport which you cannot practice without the support of your parents. Mats’ sister Liv is a cyclist too, and without the unconditional backing of their mother Angie, as well, both would not be where they are now. Aged 16, Mats gradually became more serious about biking as his father elaborated his first training plans, with clear evidence that Mats was not only a good pupil at school, but that he could also rigorously follow the precepts of the road to success.
Soon Mats revealed himself as a gifted climber, with less muscle mass compared to a lot of his competitors in Luxembourg who were early developers. Hence, it was more difficult for him to win races in Luxembourg were most of the climbs are short and sprinter-puncher qualities often decided on the outcome of races. Once Mats could compete abroad e.g. Oberösterreich Juniorenrundfahrt or Grand Prix Rüebliland in 2019, he was able to show he had an affinity for climbs that were not too long (such as in the Ardennes hills) as he was not too much disadvantaged by his power-to-weight ratio. But Mats also likes time trials…
A word here about Mats’ character, how he races, and how he has developed his profile and his character, apart from his physical aptitudes. Once Mats became seriously involved in cycling, he started to train outside by himself, which made it easier to follow the training plans (because riding alone is simply harder and it’s easier to precisely follow the instructions). Indeed, riding on his own across the Luxembourgish and Belgian Ardennes hills, fighting the elements all the time, surely helped to develop certain skills and strengths. Before becoming a professional rider with Lidl-Trek, mountain training camps were mostly organized among friends, which made it easier to withstand the boredom of being quite far away from home or even on his own.
According to his otherwise devoted parents, Mats was never spoiled with his material (bicycles and the likes) when he was a child. At the very beginning, he even had to compete in his first road races on his mountain bike! It's obvious Mats’ parents played a crucial role, seeing the side effects of over-ambitious parents, buying expensive bicycles and pushing their kids too hard too early. Most of these kids have since withdrawn from this beautiful but demanding sport. Funnily enough, after Mats’ very first training, at the age of 8, he did not want to go back a second time, probably because everything was new and somehow demanding and young Mats was not so keen on leaving his comfort zone at that age. Also, Mats was the youngest of his age category, and riding an alu bike, with most other kids showing off their carbon frames… Now it's Mats’ occasion to exhibit state-of-the-art Trek cycles…
Mats always liked and still likes the three main cycling disciplines, which are mounting biking, road cycling and cyclo-cross. While, unfortunately, there are few mountain bike races in Luxembourg, until one or two years ago, every winter Mats took part in both national and international cyclo-cross competitions, including the world championships in February 2020. But he also admits that to rival with the likes of allrounders Pidcock or Van der Poel, he lacks talent and strength, especially since he is not a puncher. He has therefore decided to focus on his career as a professional roadie and respect the strategies of his employer, Lidl-Trek, and to set his goal on mountain stages in multi-day races. Mats hopes to integrate the pro-team of Lidl-Trek as early as the 2025 season.
As a racer, Mats is very pro-active, he likes to attack, he is not scared of doing his part of the lead in the wind. These are features his father did not push or force him to develop, and neither did he advise his son to spare his forces for the last kilometer. For a long time, racing was just a game for Mats and he has managed to hold on to this playful attitude until today, like in Glasgow, for the U23 World Championships 2023, where he attacked once during the first kilometers, and later missed the group with the final winner… Another episode of this playful spirit at attacking could be observed during the 2023 Tour de Luxembourg, where Mats escaped early in each stage, alone or with some other rides, in order to win the jersey for the best climber (which he managed to keep until the end of race, indeed!). Often, riders that show this kind of attacking spirit, who are able to sacrifice themselves for their team mates, and who do not spare their efforts, are more visible and hence more interesting for prestigious squads, than those that regularly win in the youth categories.
TO BE FOLLOWED :-)