Fem van Empel (Jumbo-Visma) maintained her 100% win record in the 2023-24 cyclocross season at round 2 of the X2O Trofee series in Kortrijk, recovering from a rare early crash and powering away from Lucinda Brand (Baloise Trek Lions) to take another solo victory.
The World Champion hit the deck on the second lap as she lost control behind Puck Pieterse (Fenix-Deceuninck) and catapulted towards the barriers, but Van Empel wasn’t phased and worked instead to regain the time lost to Pieterse on Brand, utilising her power on the long straights to cut the deficit.
Once she rejoined Pieterse at the front, it was an ominous sign of her strength even after two weekends off from racing cyclocross after claiming the European title.
Brand would snatch the lead off of the two 21-year-olds, but as Pieterse dropped her chain and had to stop, Van Empel smelled blood and made the race-winning move, catching and passing Brand in a flash to pull away for her eighth win of the season.
The supreme Dutchwoman extended her lead in the X2O Trofee series to a seemingly insurmountable, barring incident, 4:15 over Denise Betsema (Pauwels-Sauzen-Bingoal), with Brand in third 5:51 behind.
Van Empel’s winning margin was 26 seconds from Brand, who has been building nicely since returning from her injury sustained at the end of the road season, with Pieterse 1:05 down by the time she crossed the line.
“It’s amazing, it felt quite good during the race,” said Van Empel. “Sadly I had a crash on the second lap and that cost me a little bit of energy, but I kept my focus the whole race and that was enough.”
The podium was close to that from the last World Championships in Hoogerheide with Brand and Pieterse swapping places, and was the first time the trio have raced each other this season with their various breaks and injury recovery periods.
Van Empel won’t be at tomorrow’s World Cup round in Dublin and confirmed why in her interview in Dutch that she prefers to race only once a weekend at the moment given how young she still is at only 21.
Pieterse similarly won’t be making the trip over to Ireland, but Brand will as she headlines that round of the World Cup alongside Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado as the big favourites heading in.
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