"It'd be nice to win another rainbow jersey" - Lotte Kopecky sets her sight on doubling up at home Gravel World Championships
GravelTuesday, 01 October 2024 at 01:00
Lotte Kopecky has only just won her second road world title but she already aims for another rainbow. No, we're not looking as far as to 2025 Worlds in Rwanda. That race is firstly in a distant future, secondly unlikely to suit Kopecky. The Belgian all-rounder instead aims to make a grand debut at the gravel, taking on the Gravel World Championships in Belgium.
"I've never ridden a gravel race in my entire life but it'll be fun," Kopecky admitted in Zurich, after having won the road race ahead of Chloé Dygert and Elisa Longo Borghini. "I'm excited to do a different kind of race. I heard there's a lot of asphalt as well as the gravel and I'll do a recon when I'm back in Belgium."
"It'd be nice to win another rainbow jersey. It's a goal but without ever racing on gravel, it's hard to say what I can do. I just want to enjoy the race. Of course, I'll try to be up there to win the race."
One of her big opponents will be another multi-discipline star and compatriot Puck Pieterse. The mountain bike world champion is still yet to win road and cyclocross titles, but the gravel title would be just as valuable addition to her rapidly growing list of palmares.
"The plan is to be at the start of the Gravel World Championships in Belgium next weekend, although I heard that almost all the elite women from the Netherlands are also racing. It should be a fun race to watch," Pieterse said, with a clear sense of humour after the Netherlands tactical blunder in Saturday's women's road race.
"I'll continue to surf on a positive vibe for a while just like the last few weeks. It has been very busy but so far everything has always worked well."
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- I think the other side has said plenty, given comments about her reputation like what Renz said above. Perhaps this is her chance to speak up against that reputation? I have no idea but her comments seem pretty human, even if each person has their own version of the story.RidesHills24-11-2024
- Give her a team built around her with no competing leaders, like Pogacar has at UAE or Vingegaard has at Visma (seeing how Roglic left), and I wonder how Vollering would do. She’s already so good, and a team dedicated to her could make her even better.RidesHills24-11-2024
- Those injuries, an ability to manage pain and push himself, probably a load of TUEs to help him get back from an awful moment, and competing that hard without the long exercise base that was the norm - no wonder he was exhausted. We’ve now had two consecutive seasons of the second place rider having an injury that interrupts training, and it shows to what level their bodies are tuned for the insane task of winning the Tour. I certainly hope both (and their teams!) are healthy next year. It would be a first, after 4 years.RidesHills24-11-2024
- Winners seem to be like this. Win or lose, it is always on to the next thing. They don’t celebrate the big win, they don’t worry about the painful loss. They move on. It’s an amazing skill. But to be able to ride (and win) while not being able to walk? That’s a level of pain management that boggles my mind. Of course they have it, given what they put their bodies through, but it’s just crazy.RidesHills24-11-2024
- Poor Demi. But she behaves the same way when riding for the national team. Bring me my tiny violin.Renz24-11-2024
- good pointsmij24-11-2024
- Yes, please tell us based on your superior expertise about why JVs training and race schedule is wrong 🧐Crashjames24-11-2024
- I'd like to hear what the other side has to say.mij24-11-2024
- Rules are very different from country to country and evolve with time. At one point I couldn’t even give my son my nationality because being unmarried, you’d have to register at least 3 months before the birth, a time when many people know neither the name or sex, and actually, no-one even knows if the birth will take place. In England there is now a kid with the wrong sex on his birth certificate as mistakes (even if by an administration) can no longer be corrected. I just had a 3rd child, we discovered a bump on his head at 2 weeks that wasn’t there 24h before, we ended up at the police accused of child abuse and about to have him taken from us due to staff incompetence and inexperience. Luckily a pediatric neurosurgeon has now confirmed this is not so uncommon after natural childbirth without instruments but most medical employees aren’t informed of it so automatically accuse parents of negligence/lying whatever. We discovered an association that already helped over 1000 wrongly accused couples (just those who found the association in just one country). I almost got arrested in one country for forgery after trying to convert my driver’s license as they thought I must have tampered the dates to get it aged 17 which isn’t possible for them. I can’t access half official services because the online forms are not set up to accept foreign phone number as data but a number is obligatory. That’s just a quick start, anyone who’s ever had to move internationally will confirm, there’s very little that’s not done differently elsewhere than “at home” The world is full of bureaucratic shit destroying society.Mistermaumau23-11-2024
- Bruyneel is not a person you take honesty or moral advice from.Sweep23-11-2024