MTB – XCC – World Cup 2024 – 4 – Val di Sole [FULL RACE] (ladies)

June 14, 2024

MTB – XCC – World Cup 2024 WE – 4 – – Val di Sole, Italy 🇮🇹

As the name suggests, these races take place on shorter versions of the XCO tracks, and are usually around 20 minutes in length. It’ll have fewer big features than the main XCO course, and is an all-out race from start to finish. The XCC kicks off the weekend of racing, taking place on the Friday evening. Short track was initially introduced to the World Cup series in 2018, when it was used to determine the start grid for the XCO race, and fed into the overall points. From 2022, the short track still determines Sunday’s start and there are points available for the XCO overall, but it also has its own overall competition.

It was a good day for Alpecin-Deceuninck as Puck Pieterse and World Champion Sam Gaze triumphed in the elite women’s and elite men’s short track openers, respectively, at the fourth round of the UCI Mountain Bike World Series in Val di Sole, Trentino.

Pieterse won the women’s race by just one second ahead of World Champion Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (Ineos Grenadiers) in a two-rider sprint to the line, while Savilia Blunk (Decathlon Ford Racing Team) finished in third place at five seconds back.

“I played my own tactic by riding on the front. I’m so happy I could play it smart in the final and take the win in the end. I thought I would use everything in the course that was hard to spread out the field and make sure I was racing for the podium,” Pieterse said.

Ferrand-Prévot suggested she possibly could have played things differently in the end.

“It was fast but a comfortable pace, and I was waiting, waiting, waiting, but in the end, I was waiting too long. Puck attacked many times and was so strong. In the end, she deserved the win,” Ferrand-Prévot said.

Alessandra Keller (Thömus Maxon) continues to lead the UCI Cross-country Short Track World Cup standings.

Results :