Determined Lucinda Brand heads to CX World Championships as "a more complete cyclocross rider" than ever before
Cyclocross
35-year-old Lucinda Brand has been consistently proving age is just a number this winter, taking on and beating her much younger cyclocross rivals Puck Pieterse and Fem van Empel among others. As such, the Baloise Glowi Lions star heads to the upcoming World Championships one of the favourites for the Rainbow Jersey.
“Right now, more riders are racing on this very, very high level, which makes it way harder,” Brand says in a Trek press release ahead of this weekend's Rainbow Jersey fight in Lievin. “So in that way, I think this season is stronger. I think I’m a better rider. Maybe not physically better, but a more complete cyclocross rider. All the other skills you need are getting better and better, and that’s how I’ve ended up doing such a great season, I think.”
With the Lievin course, by almost all experts accounts, more favoured to the power riders, it seems to be a very well-suited course for Brand herself. The Dutch star now has to balance outside expectations with her own ambitious goals for the race.
“When I raced World Championships as a younger rider, of course it was a different experience. You don’t always know what’s coming, what you can expect,” Brand concludes. “But now it’s more like a healthy way of excitement and nerves towards the race. And luckily I am experiencing it, because otherwise I think it should be time to quit [laughs]. I also know when I’m getting a bit nervous, I can do a good race. So this is really good.”
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- Wout Van Aert won a Monument (San Remo, 2020), so he wouldn't be in that article. He might be in an article of riders like Sagan who were truly exceptional and won fewer monuments that expected. As for these two, they've won the last 7 monuments, 10 of the last 12, 15 of the last 20. Merckx and de Vlaeminck weren't that dominant in their era. It really is special the way these two race with such admiration for each other along the way. Rivals, not enemies.RidesHills14-04-2025
- So drunk Belgians will always target MvDP because they are drunk. That can't be right. If drunk Belgians target all other cyclist equally, then it may be reasonable.
KerisVroom14-04-2025 - Nobody cares about this nonsense.
Front24214-04-2025 - Thanks! Hadn’t heard of that word so would have been hard to search very specifically without your input.Mistermaumau14-04-2025
- Ok, that’s this year’s gold medal for classy comments :-)Mistermaumau14-04-2025
- of course it’s predictable. a dad is proud of his son. nothing else matters, and his dad was a celebrated rider in his own right. maybe if people respected the human side of this story, and these people, we would see fewer bidons thrown. lastly as a dad, I appreciate this. a dad should have be given grief for showing pride and love for his child. we need more dads and examples like Adriemij14-04-2025
- i willfully CHOOSE to believe in your theory about greatness being sharpened and driven by greatness, because in my ideal world that’s how i’d wish it to be. in this case, with mathieu in particular, i think the presence of first wout then tadej absolutely drives and consumes him to some degree. he’s a guy who admittedly gets BORED. and when mathieu gets bored he just goes and does something else. he’s very clear about the fact there are a BUNCH of things he just doesn’t really care about, and i think anyone who follows him has a sense that MVDP is here for a GOOD TIME, not a LONG TIME. my hope is that tadej’s greatness will keep mathieu focused and hungry. very sadly, wout no longer fills that role. he may again and i hope he does, but their career trajectories are going in different directions and have been for a few years now. i will be extremely sad for the truly SPECTACULAR van aert if his line MSR win is the only monument trophy on his mantle. at very least i want ONE roubaix cobblestone sitting next to it. he deserves to tell the story when the grandkids ask “why is there a big rock sitting up there, papa?”OCexile14-04-2025
- Why? He is being too hard on himself. No sane person will blame him if he stopped there and then.KerisVroom14-04-2025
- You can find a quick explantion by searching for "finish line camera howtown". The camera only captures the vertical line. The photo that we see is a composite of vertical lines.KerisVroom14-04-2025
- Let us not go off the deep end for a start it us not attempted murder. At most common assault. Country dependent. Yes horrible to see and ob not a real fan of the sport or just a VDP hater. This has been going on for years look at Froome in the TDF and other sports such as football. That is soccer to the North Americans. Let the police do there job and hope the offender gets what is coming to him or even her.paultryan200214-04-2025