Eli Iserbyt takes important comeback win in special race: "As a child I watched the cross in Baal, it was the reason I wanted to become a crosser"

Eli Iserbyt hadn't won since the first World Cup round in the World Cup Antwerpen in late November, and has since struggled with nerve pain on one of his legs. It has been a very difficult period, but luckily for him it evaded the X2O Badkamerts Trofee's races. Today he saw his best level again and took the win in the GP Sven Nys Baal, also extending his lead in the cup over the absentees van der Haar and Vanthourenhout.

"In the beginning I had to get into it a bit. I knew it was a long race. We also discussed in advance to focus on the last half hour," Iserbyt said in a post-race interview. "I felt pretty good in the first two laps and at the end I could make the difference with a good acceleration. But I think Pim [Ronhaar] and Emiel [Verstrynge] also rode a very good race."

The Belgian didn't seem to be having the legs to win today at the start of the race, but he slowly moved through the field and reached the head of the race. With a superb performance, he dropped Ronhaar and Verstrynge to take the win.

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“I felt a bit more power in my left leg again. That's nice. You can then go a bit more full on those power parts. The parts on the saddle also went a bit better. I'm very happy. It's also very nice for the new sponsor Cibel that we can take that first victory with us right away.”

His World Cup and Superprestige standings are unlikely to yield much success, but after today his lead in the X2O Trofee is of 3:36 minutes to Toon Aerts, which places him as the man to beat with three races to go.

"I have to work very hard. It's very difficult to return from an injury during the Christmas period, because there are a lot of crosses. I wanted to cross today. I'm very happy to win. It's my second time. As a child I watched the cross in Baal, it was the reason I wanted to become a crosser. To win here, it does me a lot of good," he concluded.

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