Puck Pieterse sprints to Mountain Bike XCC World Series victory as Tom Pidcock is denied by Mathis Azzaro at Nové Město Na Moravě

After a spring spent racing on the road in Classics, multi-discipline riders Puck Pieterse (Fenix-Premier Tech) and Tom Pidcock (Pinarello Q36.5) made their WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series debuts Saturday in Czechia. Both fought through the field to contend for victory, but the decisive final straight settled the outcome differently in each race.

After a fast start, Pieterse made her way through traffic from close to the back of the pack to hit the front at the start of lap three. From then on, the Dutch rider attacked up the climb every lap in the second half of the race, putting her competition in the red each time, even if she couldn’t shake them off.