Nys and Van den Brandt Win the Sand Race

November 26, 2007
Dutch rider Daphne Van den Brand has won the Elite Women’s World Cup race in Koksijde. She was the strongest in the sand of this Belgium seaside community. American rider Katie Compton had the strongest start, but unlike the other races she participated in, didn’t drop her main rivals, World Champion Maryline Salvetat and Dutch rider Daphne Van den Brand. It was clear that the long stretches of sand weren’t much to Compton’s liking, and halfway through the race she had to let go of the duo. In the last lap, after Salvetat had given her all, Van den Brandt rode away from her, and Compton was able to close and get second.

Van den Brand was surprised by her win. "The last few weeks I had some troubles with my back. I was first thinking that I trained too much, but that wasn’t the case. A visit to the chiropractor solved it.” She really liked the course. “Absolutely, this is real cross. A race where you have to be focused all the time.”

Katie Compton still has something to learn in the sand. “I made bunches of mistakes. Pretty quickly I realized that I had to ride today to keep the damage limited.”

Other North Americans racing in the sand were Canadian Lyne Bessette and Americans Mo Bruno Roy and Christine Vadaros. Bessette battled another bout of the flu and jetlag to finish a respectable 12th gaining valuable UCI points in the process. Bruno Roy and Vadaros finished a distant 26th and 29th respectively.

Sven Nys won his second World cup after his win in Tabor. After a bad start and a long chase he was able to drop Klaas Vantornhout in the last lap to solo to victory. Vantornhout didn’t even make the podium after going all out, being overtaken by his Fidea team mate Erwin Vervecken and Dutch Champion Lars Boom.

This race in the sand dunes along the Belgium coast is usually marred by lots of spills. In today’s edition, on a completely re-designed course, the first spill happened on the pavement though, ending the race of Italian champion Enrico Franzoi before it even started.

Lars Boom set the pace in the early goings, with his team mate Nys trying to catch on after having a bad start and a couple of spills. Boom had company up front from Bart Wellens and Sven Vanthourenhout. With Nys not present Wellens tried to get away. But Nys was just too strong, leading a group back to Wellens’ wheel. This group stayed together, with Nys and Vantornhout getting a small advantage after a Vervecken slip going into the last lap. That’s when the leader in the UCI-standings rode away from his companion to solo to victory. It was his second World Cup win of the season, and the 37th of his career. He has won the last three races here.

“This is a beautiful win”, said winner Nys afterwards. “I wanted to save some energy, but had a bad early going. I had to go deep a couple of times to close the gap, and on top of that I made a couple of stupid steering mistakes in the descent. But at no time I had to go really deep, which enabled me to make the gap in the end. I like this course a lot; I wouldn’t mind it if they organized another World Championship here.”

Erwin Vervecken’s second place was his best result of the season so far. “I knew I was starting to go a bit better lately. I’m on the podium here for the third time, and I think I rode a good race. Too bad I got stuck in the sand on the penultimate lap. This was a really tough race, the toughest one in the last five years. This doesn’t make good of my bad season start, but it helps. There is still plenty of racing coming up. In the series racing Nys is unstoppable, but there will be room to try something in the Championships.”

The Next race for the World Cup is this coming Sunday, December 2nd, in the Spanish town of Igorre.

There are no separate standings for the World Cup like there is for the Superprestige. Only UCI points are at stake; the leader of the UCI-points standings gets to wear the blue leaders’ jersey.

Look for some moving pictures here
‘wedstrijdverslag’ for a short recap of the race, and ‘laatste ronde’ for the last lap.

Results Elite Women: 1. Daphny van den Brand (Ned) in 41.32; 2. Katie Compton (USA) at 0.07; 3. Maryline Salvetat (Fr) 0.10; 4. Reza Hormes-Ravenstijn (Ned) 0.40; 5. Helen Wyman (GBr) 0.42; 6. Stephanie Pohl (Ger); 7. Sanne Cant (B) 1.04; 8. Arenda Grimberg (Ned) 1.24; 9. Pavla Havlikova (Cz) 1.42; 10. Mirjam Melchers-Van Poppel (Ned) 1.52; 11. Nadia Triquet-Claude (Fr) 2.06; 12. Lyne Bessette (Can) 2.11; 13. Katrien Pauwels (B) 2.13; 14. Veerle Ingels (B) 2.18; 15. Birgit Hollmann (Ger) 2.42; 16. Saskia Elemans (Ned) 2.48; 17. Christelle Ferrier-Bruneau (Fr) 3.06; 18. Abke Francissen (Ned) 3.14; 19. Susanne Juranek (Ger) 3.21; 20. Elke Riedl (Ned) 3.24; 21. Linda Van Rijen (Ned) 4.16; 22. Anja Nobus (B) 4.35; 23. Katrien Aerts (B) 4.50; 24. Joyce Vanderbeken (B); 25. Gabriella Day (GBr) 4.59; 26. Maureen Bruno Roy (USA) 5.01; 27. Nicole Kampeter (Ger) 5.17; 28. Daniela Bresciani (It) 5.33; 29. Christine Vardaros (USA) 5.38

Koksijde Men’s Results