Dazzling Last Lap Burst Sees Vanthourenhout Win

Michael Vanthourenhout won a hard-fought, tightly contested round of the cyclocross World Cup Sunday, darting forward inside the closing minute to seize the victory.

The Pauwels Sauzen-Altez Industriebouw rider tussled with Joris Nieuwenhuis for much of the nine lap race in Sardinia, Italy, with those two followed by a large group benefiting from their slipstream. The flat course did include sand and mud sections but was otherwise bereft of selective points, with this and the fast speed enabling things to stay together.

Vanthourenhout finally snapped the elastic just before the finish, gapping Nieuwenhuis (Ridley Racing Team) and Laurens Sweeck (Crelan-Corendon) on the asphalt section inside the final 500 meters. He carried that advantage through the dismount point at the church steps and raced in to the line a second clear of Nieuwenhuis and Sweeck.

Ryan Kamp and Niels Vandeputte (both Alpecin-Deceuninck development team) were fourth and fifth, seven and eight seconds behind.

“It was a really difficult week, so it is good to be back fighting for the win,” Vanthourenhout said. “I am happy.”

He and Nieuwenhuis looked particularly good all race but shaking off the other riders proved to be very difficult. They all remained close behind and were reluctant to contribute, although Sweeck and Pim Ronhaar (Baloise Glowi Lions) did hit the front on occasion.

However Vanthourenhout and Nieuwenhuis looked to be a level above, and so it turned out with those two taking first and second.

“I was a little bit better on the sand sections but it was difficult to fight for the positions,” Vanthourenhout said.

“On the last lap I gave everything from the finish [of the penultimate lap – ed] until the next lap for the finish. I felt very strong, so it is good to be back fighting for the win.”

A deadlocked race…until it no longer was

Sunday’s race took place in Terralba in Sardinia, and saw the absence of several key names. World Cup round 1 winner and series leader Thibau Nys didn’t make the trip, and neither did Lars van der Haar and Cameron Mason.

However there were other strong riders there and right away from the start Nieuwenhuis and Vanthourenhout set about showing they were the ones best suited to the course. It was flat, fast and while it included some sandpits and mud sections, giving those two riders a chance to turn the screw, the remainder of the course was not decisive enough for gaps to persist.

Things stayed very close together throughout the race, with the lead group hovering close to double digits and at times appearing like the riders were doing a criterium rather than a cross race.

Ronhaar finally gave Nieuwenhuis and Vanthourenhout a brief break from the front on lap 5, temporarily detaching several riders, while Sweeck put in his own first surge one lap later. Things were still together ending the penultimate lap but the pace had visibly increased, as had the grimaces on faces of various riders.

Ronhaar faded towards the end of that lap and Vanthourenhout, Nieuwenhuis and Sweeck then pushed ahead in anticipation of the finish. The tussle for positions was followed by a daring surge by Vanthourenhout, who immediately put daylight between himself and the other two, and held his advantage through the dismount and brief run up of the steps of the Madonna di Bonaria church.

That Hail Mary move paid off in spades, with Vanthourenhout succeeded in breaking the other two and securing his first World Cup win and fourth victory of the season.

Nys’ absence doesn’t stop him retaining the series lead. Sweeck stays second overall but is now just four points behind, while Nieuwenhuis moves up one place to third and Vanthourenhout leaps up seven places to fouth overall.

The next round of the World Cup is likely to see an upsurge in interest, with Mathieu van der Poel set to contest his first cyclocross race of the season. It is the fourth out of 12 events and takes place in Namur, Belgium.

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