The great cycling talent Fem van Empel has also won the third cyclo-cross for the World Cup. On the fast course in Tabor, Czech Republic, six more women battled for victory in the final round. But the 20-year-old rider from Sint-Michielsgestel did not let it come to a sprint and drove away from compatriots Puck Pieterse and Annemarie Worst.
Van Empel, currently competing for the Belgian Pauwels Sauzen-Bingoal, previously won both World Cup crosses in the United States. On January 1, she will transfer to Jumbo-Visma. There she comes under the care of Marianne Vos. Van Empel said afterwards that the jet lag had played tricks on her.
“My legs didn’t feel so good, I haven’t slept well the last few days,” she explained her somewhat defensive way of riding. “All I could do was follow. And on the last slope I attacked.”
“There will come a time when I have to take my rest.”
It had been Pieterse who, thanks to her jumps over the beams, was often in the lead, with five riders in her track in the final lap: four compatriots and the Hungarian Kata Blanka Vas.
On the last crossing over the beams, Pieterse tried to drive away one more time. Worst and Van Empel were able to follow, after which the latter took off in the final kilometer and recorded her third victory. “I never expected this, but the season is still long. There will come a time when I have to take my rest.”
In any case, she will be there next week when the fourth game awaits in Maasmechelen in Belgium. In the World Cup standings, Van Empel leads with 120 points. Sausage follows with 71 while Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado, sixth on Sunday, is third.
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