"I made two crucial mistakes... I thought Lucinda would pass me" - Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado survives to triumph in World Cup Namur thriller

In a thrilling finale, Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado held off a late charge from Lucinda Brand to secure victory at the World Cup Namur on Sunday afternoon, taking her first World Cup victory of the season in the process.

In a particularly brutal edition of the renowned yearly battle in Namur, Alvarado was faultless until the final lap, entering it with an advantage of over 20 seconds. As she began to make a few small errors though, Brand, like a shark smelling blood, began to hunt down the lone leader at one point looked like completing a famous comeback victory. In the end though, Alvarado's buffer proved just enough to hold on for the thrilling win.

“If you had told me beforehand that it would be like this, I would have signed up for it immediately,” reflected a beaming Alvarado in her post-race interview afterwards. “I really didn’t expect this. It’s such a good weekend after taking a break. I had really good legs today. I just rode my own pace and that paid off.”

“At a certain point I started to feel the fatigue. That caused me to make a few mistakes here and there. In the last lap I also couldn’t see anything through my glasses," she continues. "I couldn’t see which track I was riding in and what I was doing. That was quite difficult. I thought Lucinda would still pass me, but luckily I was able to keep her behind me.”

“Was I afraid? When I started making those mistakes, yes. Not before that, because my lead was quite big and I saw her riding. I thought I could keep it up until the end, but then I made two crucial mistakes. I thought to myself 'I'm going to have to cycle even faster', but I actually couldn't. Fortunately, I was able to pick up speed on the running section and in the descent," Alvarado concludes. "There it was a matter of squeezing everything out until the finish.”