Lucinda Brand on how hard the World Cup in Hulst had been: "I'm still standing here panting, even though we finished twenty minutes ago"

Lucinda Brand finished third in the Hulst World Cup. In the Dutch cross, she couldn't beat winner Puck Pieterse and Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado, but she still achieved a podium place at the expense of Fem van Empel who lost some of her invincibility today.

"I think Puck had a very good start," said Brand. "She could ride her own lines all the time and was very good in the mud lanes. Ceylin and I really tried to help each other. We both had our strengths on the course. She surprised me a bit on the last lap in the descent. I didn't panic, but I had a hard time again on the mud part. That was the deciding factor. Puck also had a hard time there, so Ceylin gave everything to win. Then I had to fight for third place. Because when you are really tired, you make stupid mistakes here."

One and a half laps from the end, Alvarado and Brand still had leader Pieterse in sight, but the Baloise - Trek Lions rider was not thinking about winning at that moment. "Not about winning, because you are still with two very strong riders, who are really good on a circuit like this. I did believe that we could still bring her back, but that doesn't mean you win the race. But you do fight for it."

Brand had to go very deep, she emphasized. "There really wasn't a moment of peace. It's a completely different level of fatigue at this speed than when you're stomping through the mud. It's always a new sprint. I'm still standing here panting, even though we've already finished about twenty minutes ago."