PREVIEW | Cyclocross Dublin World Cup Men&Women - Favourites, Track, TV Guide & Poll

The 9th round of the UCI Cyclocross World Cup 2022-2023 will take place in Dublin, Ireland, for a new track in the circuit which will be quite a special event for many riders. After replacing the expected London race, Dublin will fill in for one of the final pre-Christmas races, with most of the stars included in the startlist.

The temperatures will be very low, only 2 degrees maximum, and the race will be marked by a lot of thaw. Over this week it has snowed in the Irish capital and the temperatures are so low that the melted water just stays in the terrain. A very grassy route, it will hence have a lot of mud and boggy sections. In my eyes it's a circuit that resembles Fayetteville a lot in the fact that it's virtually featureless and very fast. However it will be completely muddy and will be a slogfest.

The track is in fact extremely simple. It includes an artificial sand pit and two small banks towards the end that can be treacherous, alongside the bariers. Those are the only real features, but it will be a very hard race because the mud is all throughout. In some places it will be very slow and force the riders into very low cadence, and in other spots it will be very slippery and could see small crashes.

The key for the race will be to stay upright. It's a race where you can spend 100% of the time on the bike, and the fact that most riders already rode the circuit the day before they will know the lines better than a normal race and errors can be more costly as I don't expect many. There will be slippage, there will be tons of bike changes, clogged shoes, roaring disk brakes. It'll be a race of making sure you don't make mistakes and keep the bike in good conditions.

The startlist for the women's race is incredibly modest. With the Christmas block coming, road teams hosting their pre-season training camps, no Superprestige or X2O Trofee race and a World Cup far from home, only 27 riders signed up for the race. Between those, it has become clear only four are fighting for a position in the World Cup, amongst the best riders. The race however will be another battle between cup leader Fem van Empel and Puck Pieterse, both under-23 riders who have taken the helm of the Elite ranks this year.

Denise Betsema will be a good outsider, and main candidate to conclude the podium, and Inge van der Heijden will be the fourth figure in the list as she looks to climb up the ranks. There are truly no other podium contenders on a normal day. The likes of Manon Bakker, Marie Schreiber and INEOS Grenadier's Pauline Ferrand-Prevot have an unique chance to score high in the World Cup.

The men's race on the other hand will feature all the main figures except for Mathieu van der Poel. A muddy race such as this will be a very difficult day and one that could see some surprises. Tom Pidcock and Eli Iserbyt for example are riders who do not usually fare as well in such a flat and muddy track, but the latter is dreaming of the World Cup win and will want to finish as best as possible regardless of the position.

He will be facing cup leader Laurens Sweeck who on paper could perform decently here, however as Iserbyt, he isn't looking as sharp as he has earlier in the year. Both begin to have the competition of Michael Vanthourenhout who is getting near and has thrived in Antwerp last week. As was the case in Namur and Overijse, he has thrived in the mud - although this race will lack the climbing. Nevertheless he could be a big contender. Wout van Aert however in my opinion is the man to beat as the race suits him quite well and he's shown good enough form last week in Antwerp to take a win. Lars van der Haar will also be a key rider to take into consideration. Joris Nieuwenhuis, Niels Vandeputte, Jens Adams, Pim Ronhaar, Kevin Kuhn and Toon Vandebosch will all be outsiders within the Top10.

The women's race will start at 12:40 local time (12:40CET) and is estimated to finish at 13:30 local time (13:30CET). The men's race is set to start at 14:10 local time (14:10CET) and is estimated to finish at around 14:15 local time (14:15CET).

You can watch the broadcast of the race at the UCI website; GCN+/Eurosport Player internationally. The channels which will broadcast the race will be Flobikes (Canada/USA), Telenet PlaySports and Proximus (Belgium).

PREDICTIONS:

Women's Elite
*** Fem van Empel
** Puck Pieterse, Denise Betsema
* Inge van der Heijden, Manon Bakker, Marie Schreiber

Men's Elite
*** Wout van Aert
** Michael Vanthourenhout, Laurens Sweeck
* Tom Pidcock, Lars van der Haar, Eli Iserbyt