When the final three competitions of Saturday’s last round UCI Track Cycling Champions League were cancelled due to a horrible crash in the women’s keirin first round, few expected that it would take nearly four days for the principal stakeholders to declare overall winners in three of the four categories. But on Wednesday, the Champions League finally declared that Canadian Dylan Bibic had repeated as men’s endurance champion: “Katie Archibald secured her Women Endurance title with victory in the Scratch race. UCI Commissaires agreed to award victory to the leaders in the other three leagues based on points at the time of cancellation.”
The other Canadian in this year’s league, Sarah van Dam, couldn’t keep her second overall spot but her fourth is her best of the three consecutive seasons she has contested.
The Situation Going into Saturday
Van Dam was 26 points behind category leader Katie Archibald and four points better than Anita Yvotte Stenberg. Bibic won Friday’s elimination race and led Dane Tobias Aagaard Hansen by 17 points, having increased his gap from nine points.
Saturday’s Action
As on Friday, the endurance action started with the women’s scratch race. Stenberg won Friday’s 30-lap affair. With 10 laps to go, someone finally tried to break free, an Irish rider, but to no avail. Then a Dane went for it but also couldn’t make it stick. In the sprint, Archibald resisted Stenberg, who climbed over ninth-place van Dam in the overall standings. Archibald wrapped up the 2024 title.
Next up was the men’s scratch, critical to Bibic securing the 2024 title. American Peter Moore won on Friday with Bibic 10th. The first third of the 30 laps were calm. Yesterday’s scratch runner-up Alex Vogel then took his leave, drawing Austrian Tim Wafler. But their move came back with 12 laps to go. On the outside, Bibic made his move on the final lap. Belgian Lyndsay de Vylder took the win with Bibic sixth and Hansen ninth. The Canadian’s lead was now 20 points.
Sarah van Dam’s final competition of the 2024 Champions League was the women’s elimination race. Would she retain third overall? Irish riders were the first to get the hook. Van Dam was the fifth rider to get the yank. By coming third after an earlier third in the scratch, Ireland’s Lara Gillespie knocked the Canadian down to fourth. In 2022 van Dam was…
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