"Bad luck always comes along" - Laurens Sweeck and Michael Vanthourenhout react to Eli Iserbyt's World Cup win
Cyclocross
Laurens Sweeck finished second in the World Cup Antwerpen, the first World Cup race of the cyclocross season, and the thirty year old was only beaten by Eli Iserbyt. Sweeck won 2 world cup races in the 2022/2023 season, and he is hoping to get back to winning ways soon. Speaking to Sporza after the race, Sweeck revealed that he was still very happy with his performance.
“I am satisfied. The best rider won. Halfway through the race I didn't really have an answer to Iserbyt's attack,” he said. "Without that puncture, it would have been a close call for second place.
“But in the end, bad luck always comes along. This time it went my way."
Sweeck is still trying to get back to the form that saw him win the Belgium national championships back in 2020, and he has already had some strong results this season.
Behind Sweeck, Michael Vanthourenhout took third after he suffered a puncture on the last lap. “I think I would have been on my way to second place without that flat tire,” he said.
“Just after the first material post I felt like I was riding on a flat tire. It was difficult to keep up with Laurens then. It was too close to the finish to come back.
“I am happy that things are going a bit better again. I also don’t know why I had a bad period. I consciously chose to go to Spain last week. It pays off immediately. I hope to be back in Spain after another week.”
Vanthourenhout went on to congratulate his teammate Eli Iserbyt on his win, admitting, “"We did feel some pressure from the team, but also from outside. But, we showed this weekend that we are back as a team. The most important period starts now, with the World Cup. We hope we can continue this."
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- yeah, that’s a more fair assessment. “reaching mathieu’s level” doesn’t mean you’re planning to replicate his whole career. the former IS doable, potentially. it’s just the latter that likely is not.OCexile25-12-2024
- That’s not entirely true. Every person follows their own development path and peaks differently. Remco and Primoz had hardly started cycling before elite level. Jonas was pretty much under the radzr until he unexpectedly had to take over responsibility at JV. Some guys only get real good in their thirties others have peaked mid-twenties. You can’t tell in advance how and upto what level they will progress, obviously his career might not have MVDPs length but nothing says he could not end up doing a few seasons at his level.Mistermaumau25-12-2024
- well, del grosso is 21 right now. when mathieu was a year younger than that, he was already winning elite level world championships, not U23. i think del grosso will be a very good pro for years, but if he was really going to be the next van der poel someday, he’d already have to be at that level right NOW. van der poel was showing signs of true greatness when he was 15-16. THAT’S what generational talent looks like.OCexile25-12-2024
- Yeah.... gear 😅.mikolajjj24-12-2024
- It shouldn’t be about expectations in the first place should it? Besides, if you look at everyone’s calculations as a whole they don’t add up in the first place. There’ll be 2-3 riders with a 50% chance, a dozen with 10 or 20% and dozens more with a 5% so we’re expecting at least 2 if not 3 winners. Remind me again who won before her? Says it all about using data to decide on participation.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- Ok, happy I’m not too interested in this team coz’ the account of what happened is really hard to follow.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- The UCI is worse than USA CyclingVeganpotter24-12-2024
- It's not like they wanted her to not win😅 She had an outstanding Olympics. But there's a reason why she wasn't expected to win the road race and that's ok. Things like this happen and it's great...better than seeing expected winners win.Veganpotter24-12-2024
- Bruyneel ? The man with a lifetime ban from cycling...why do you keep giving him and his doper mate, Armstrong, a platform?DJ24-12-2024
- yeah, agree. on the subject of being a “complete rider,” i do think that’s getting more interesting. mathieu seems to have decided he wants to get much better at climbing the the high mountain passes. he appears to be looking for new challenges, which should be interesting to watch. in most cases you’d dismiss a goal like that at age 30, but it’s mvdp. he’s never going to climb with the real climbers, but if he can improve enough it could open up stage wins when the parcours isnt just purely toothy and punchy.OCexile24-12-2024