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Marlen Reusser retained her world time-trial title in Montreal on Sunday as her expected main challenger, Demi Vollering, finished a disappointing eighth.
Time-trial queen Reusser secured an ultimately comfortable victory, winning her second world championship after triumphing last year in Kigali – but not before young British rider Zoe Backstedt gave her a scare.
Backstedt had been quickest at the first two intermediate time-checks on the 39.2km (24.4 mile) course but Reusser powered away in the second half of the race to beat the 21-year-old by 40 seconds. Germany’s Franziska Koch finished third, a further six seconds back.
”It’s a good present,” said Reusser, who was competing on her 35th birthday. I also thought, win or not, I have something to celebrate.”
“From the side of pacing and understanding how fast you should go and how you should also cope with these challenges on the way, I was really nervous,” Reusser added. “I was not really sure, because we don’t have time trials like this often … I’m used to doing 20km.”
Reusser has been virtually unbeatable in races against the clock in the last few years. The Swiss cyclist is a four-time European champion and has won time-trial stages at the Tour de France Femmes and Giro d’Italia Women.
Backstedt had been a junior and twice under-23 world champion in the discipline, but this race was around 12km further than any previous time-trial she had competed in. Koch’s bronze medal continued a dream season for the German, who won Paris-Roubaix in April.
Vollering, the European road race champion, was never in the running for a medal. The men’s time trial event takes place later today in Montreal.
Van der Poel warms up with solo break
Mathieu van der Poel warmed up for his bid for a second world title with a long-range solo break on the final stage of the Tour of Luxembourg on Sunday.
The Dutch star broke clear just over a couple of kilometres into the 177km stage and held on in front all day to win by more than a minute. Van der Poel’s run is thought to be one of the longest solo breaks in the history of cycling.
The 2023 world road race champion will be one of the favourites in Montreal next weekend, where the reigning champion, Tadej Pogacar, will be missing due to injury.
“That was not the plan before the start, but I found myself alone from the start of the race in fact, and I just rode my tempo the whole day,” Van der Poel said. Italy’s Davide Piganzoli finished fourth on the stage to secure overall victory.
