Lea Sophie Friedrich has had to vacate the throne of Europe’s sprint queen. The 24-year-old defending champion from Cottbus lost the final in the most prestigious discipline at the European Track Cycling Championships in Apeldoorn, Netherlands, and took silver.
As in the 2023 World Cup final in Glasgow, the British Emma Finucane was stronger than the fastest German cyclist. Former world champion Emma Hinze secured bronze in the small final.
Two days after her triumph in the team sprint, Friedrich had to admit defeat to the reigning world champion Finucane in both final runs and thus missed an exclamation mark early in the Olympic year. This means that Kristina Vogel (2013, 2017) remains the only German to have won European Championship gold twice in the sprint.
Friedrich settles old scores
In the semifinals, Friedrich clearly dominated the French 2022 world champion Mathilde Gros and thus settled an old score – Friedrich had also lost out in the World Cup final then, as well as against Finucane a year later.
Finucane easily beat Hinze in two runs in the semi-finals on Friday. Hinze, world champion in this discipline in 2020 and 2021, gave Gros no chance in the bronze duel.
At the start on Wednesday, Friedrich, Hinze and Pauline Grabosch confidently won European Championship gold in the team sprint for the fourth time in a row. Friedrich has another chance for the title on Sunday in the Keirin, in which she has recently become world champion three times in a row.
Tobias Buck-Gramcko lost the small final in the individual pursuit over 4000 m against the Dane Rasmus Pedersen and took fourth place.