Who are the best cyclocrossers of their respective countries? Learn who will wear the National champion jerseys in the year to come!
Cyclocross
After the hectic cyclocross period around the Christmas both the riders and fans got a chance to catch a breath again with only National Championships scheduled for the weekend. And while some riders continued to dominate in their countries, we have also witnessed several shocking results. In this article you'll find who exactly will have the honour of wearing the Champion's jersey over the period of next 12 months!
Belgium
Elite: Thibau Nys & Marion Norbert Riberolle, U23: Aaron Dockx
Starting with the biggest cyclocross nations, we have witnessed exciting battles in men's races. Over in Belgium, the European champion Thibau Nys stunned his opponents with a powerful attack in the final lap and added first National champion's jersey to his palmares. Only 8 more to go to equal his father's record. The U23 was even more thrilling with Yordi Corsus and Aaron Dockx in a head-to-head battle until the final meters with the latter coming out on the top.
A day earlier, the women's race took place. Without Sanne Cant who had won previous 15 (!) editions at the start, the women's race was almost a walk in the park for Marion Norbert Riberolle who took her first Belgian title in a rather dominant fashion.
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The Netherlands
Elite: Tibor Del Grosso & Puck Pieterse
Men's race in Netherlands also provided for an exciting race. The returning Joris Nieuwenhuis added an extra spice with in an impressive ride after four months out of any competition. But ultimately it came down to a 1-on-1 between two young riders Tibor del Grosso and Pim Ronhaar. Last year's U23 World Champion Del Grosso ultimately had more in the legs and placed a decisive attack over last ramp.
Women's race was controlled by Fenix-Deceuninck duo Puck Pieterse and Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado from the start to the finish and ultimately it was the XCO World Champion who won with a convincing advantage of more than a minute over her teammate.
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Some of the less surprising results include seventh Spanish title for the runner-up from European Championships - Felipe Orts, an eighth Czech title for Michael Boros, a seventh French title for Clément Venturini, or a staggering thirteenth consecutive (!) Polish title for veteran Marek Konwa.
But we have also seen many upsets. Perhaps the biggest shock came at the British Championships where in the women's category, the title went to not very well known Xan Crees who has beaten super-talent Cat Ferguson and another up-and-coming promising rider Imogen Wolff.
Overview of the new 2024/25 National Champions:
Belgium: Thibau Nys & Marion Norbert Riberolle
The Netherlands: Tibor Del Grosso & Puck Pieterse
Spain: Felipe Orts & Sofia Rodriguez
Great Britain: Cameron Mason & Xan Crees
Switzerland: Kevin Kuhn & Rebekka Estermann
Czech Republic: Michael Boros & Kristyna Zemanová
France: Clément Venturini & Amandine Fouquenet
Luxembourg: Loïc Bettendorff´& Marie Schreiber
Poland: Marek Konwa & Antonina Bialek
Italy: Gioele Bertolini & Carlotta Borello
Germany: Marcel Meisen & Elisabeth Brandau
Denmark: Daniel Weis & Caroline Bohé
Hungary: Barnabás Vas & Regina Bruchner
Portugal: Rafael Sousa & Beatriz Guerra
Ireland: Dean Harvey & Esther Wong
Austria: Lukas Hatz & Nadja Heigl
Romania: Joszef-Attila Malnasi & Wendy Bunea
Albania: Olsian Velia & Nelia Kabetaj
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- He probably won't be able to fight for GC podium in a grand tour anyway. I haven't seen anything to suggest otherwise. His performance wasn't consistent enough for 3 weeks of race.
KerisVroom13-01-2025 - AmenMistermaumau13-01-2025
- Thank you Thijs for bringing some rationality back into this pointless rant. I know of no sport that doesn’t see continuous improvement, either steadily or in erratic steps, all I see is that the average amateur now beats champions of 2-3 generations ago, this says it ALL, humans progress, all the time when they apply the collected knowledge and methods. Coming from another sport I was always surprised at how backward cycling training was in comparison, all they’ve done is catch up. There have always been individuals who lead the way in progress whilst the lower levels take more time to catch up, but catch up they always do. The 4 minute mile or 10s sprint was once seen as unattainable, I’m pretty sure Van Gelder has never looked at a list of how many have now run faster. Next is the 2h marathon. Yes, there are dopers trying to skip the line but that doesn’t mean you can just blindly accused a winner or the best. Pog is no better than Vin in certain situations, no better than MVDP in others and isn’t unbeatable, are ALL of them doping then, with the same miracle product/technique? And why is it just them, you’d imagine if it was so effective and untraceable, they’d ALL be buyers.Mistermaumau13-01-2025
- There is for and against, the discussion is definitely worth having in order to find acceptable compromise. I don’t really know why numbers are important, you can also just play with balancing, 3 or 4 promoted / demoted instead of 2? Reducing teams to 7 to accommodate 23 or 24? Also, before jumping the gun, they need to look at (possible) consequences, all of them which are often overlooked. There are huge implications financially, we should think carefully to see how things can’t be exploited by “investors” buying their way into GTs too easily, especially now that things like contract breaking has become nothing more than a financial burden.Mistermaumau13-01-2025
- Exactly, most people who watch cycling have no idea or easily forget the skill and danger and mostly, the experience needed to ride safely in a peleton which is often akin to a flock of birds or school of fish with certain differences. Firstly, they still have individual goals, secondly they are far more limited in space by size and direction of their path, thirdly they have far more unforeseen obstacles, spectators, signs, road damage, holes, etc, fourthly, they have a machine attached which they have to control perfectly and also, speed and trajectory changes can be more sudden, especially during an incident/crash leading to a cascading of unpredictable events. Regarding the speeds at which the peleton advances (generally 35-70km/h), it is comparable to cars in traffic. Can you imagine cars moving in such unison with so little space between each other (my wife gets nervous if I’m 2 bike lengths behind a car and can’t fathom my explanation that from cycling I have an in-built reaction mechanism to be fully focused for all eventualities from the many hours spent at mere cm from the preceding rider who could brake hard at any moment for any reason I may not have noticed before him. Someone might now point out car racing takes place at far higher speeds, yes but there are huge differences, firstly, they usually only have one or two competitors at the time to focus on (and in rallye driving, none at all), secondly the roads are far wider, more perfect and without obstacles, thirdly, they are still very protected in a box and in case of an incident, trajectories and impacts are far easier and safer to predict due to momentum so all in all they can drive in a way that looks far riskier when it actually isn’t and they can focus far more on themselves than everyone else. As you’ve said, you are not going to change safety by any of the simplistic suggestions being thrown around, the reasons lie deep and are unlikely to disappear. It may be better to try to look at ways to promote less peleton. I have some interesting, nasty, revolutionary ideas, they could even make cycling a more enjoyable, exciting sport to watch, but it’s unlikely any will be acceptable, change is slow and incremental, even mobile phones took a generation to overcome resistance.Mistermaumau13-01-2025
- Must be cool to be coach to an autonomous athlete ;-)Mistermaumau13-01-2025
- Okay, so I completely agree that cycling history has shown that gains like these have ALWAYS been fueled by doping. However, personally in this case, I really don't care. Why, because this kid is so damn nice and fun and has been a positive force in cycling. Unlike Lance, who didn't care about anyone but Lance. Am I positive he is doing? No, and I'm happy to give him the benefit of doubt because he is such a fun kid.dabman13-01-2025
- no kidding. i remember when the pro peloton had the really edgy, nasty tone to it. many will want to blame armstrong for that but it went back WAAAYYYY before him. hinault presided over a culture like that, too, and others before him. it really sucked because amateur racers would emulate the pros and when i got into the sport i remember thinking “wow, bicycle racers are the biggest a**holes on the planet.” i’m not sure what caused the pro culture to change, but that change has been cemented by the greats of the sport — pogacar, van der poel, van aert, on and on — being great SPORTSMEN who are much more inclined to congratulate than hate each other. some may miss the old “get your hate on” days. i do not.OCexile12-01-2025
- Honestly, it's not just ProTeams that are arguing this: so are fans like me. I'd love to see more feisty teams struggling for points going at it against each other. I'd love to see a Cancellara team and a Contador team (what happened to them?!) up against the biggies. I'd love to see more wins like Castrillo in the Vuelta (his first was fun, his second was great!). But I also recognize that the two tier system requires that some teams fear a loss of benefit, and others seek a gain of benefit. If everyone has the benefit, is it as important to compete for it? Cycling is weird, that's my conclusion.RidesHills12-01-2025
- To summarize many things: the peloton is often separated by mere centimeters through all sorts of terrain, road furniture, and turns (the point of saving energy is to be in the slipstream), the speeds are high from the start in every race and every stage (the points system requires points for the non-dominant teams), riders are more professional these days (there is no personal training, anymore, the team determines the workout regimen, etc.), everyone is stronger (see previous point), and younger folks are more exuberant (I have kids without fully developed frontal lobes, this is my positive spin on the situation). Asking individual riders to be safer is honestly plain old BS. What people are asking for is a change in the culture, and the culture is driven by the dividends: points and wins. Rider safety only exists within systems that honor it, and the points and wins system does not. Then again, it does in the way that some teams try for a bunch of top 10s without contesting the win, and fans hate that, which means... wins more than points... and who determines the culture? fans. My biggest gripe about putting responsibility and agency on riders is that it's a peloton, it's a team sport, it's a blob of a slipstream, and you individually cannot control what happens in front of you, you just can't. Tell me how to avoid a bunch sprint crash when you're in the wrong place at the wrong time - and nobody has an answer.RidesHills12-01-2025