Harrie Lavreysen has reached the final of the sprint tournament at the European Track Cycling Championships in Apeldoorn. The five-time world champion and defending champion from Luyksgestel defeated his compatriot and eternal rival Jeffrey Hoogland in two heats in the semi-finals.
The opponent in the final is the Pole Mateusz Rudyk, who was too strong for the Israeli Mikhail Yakovlev. This makes the title battle a repeat of last year’s European Championship final.
The two riders Lavreysen (26) and Hoogland (30) have been riding the king’s track of track cycling for eight years.
Training buddies
Lavreysen last lost in 2019 on the king’s number of Hoogland. Since then he has only lost a heat to Hoogland once at a title tournament. That was in the Olympic final won by Lavreysen in Tokyo.
In the meantime, the cyclist from Luyksgestel not only won the Olympic title, but also five world titles and three European titles in the individual sprint.
Hoogland and Lavreysen were training buddies for all those years, but last summer in Glasgow the relationship cooled considerably. This had to do with Lavreysen’s choice to add former colleague printer Hugo Haak as a personal supervisor. That cold now seems to have disappeared.
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Lavreysen takes third Dutch title during National Track Cycling Championships
Harrie Lavreysen takes care of Hoogland and takes NK gold in the sprint