{"id":949069,"date":"2026-11-01T19:40:11","date_gmt":"2026-11-01T19:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/949069\/"},"modified":"2026-11-01T19:40:11","modified_gmt":"2026-11-01T19:40:11","slug":"lucinda-brands-surprise-after-a-long-cross-country-race-thats-never-happened-before","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/949069\/","title":{"rendered":"Lucinda Brand’s surprise after a long cross-country race: ‘That’s never happened before’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once again, Lucinda Brand<\/a> has demonstrated her strength in cyclocross. The Dutch rider from Baloise-Het Poetsbureau Lions proved once more on the famous Koppenberg that she is currently the best cyclocross rider, just as she was last season. This year, however, the Dordrecht native had to give it her all.Immediately after crossing the finish line, Brand got off her bike and sat down on the ground at the top of the Koppenberg<\/a>. She had just won the Koppenbergcross again<\/a>, but this time in the rainbow jersey as world champion. \u201cThe first half of the race was pretty fast\u2014it was a tough pace,\u201d Brand told IDL Pro Cycling and others in the mixed zone.<\/p>\n

Partly because of the fast pace, Brand no longer expected to be able to break away from her competitors later on.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou guys think it\u2019s all very simple, that I\u2019m taking it easy at the start, but that\u2019s definitely not the case.\u201d In the end, Brand finished just under a minute ahead of second-place finisher Sara Casasola.<\/p>\n

Continue reading below<\/p>\n

\"IMG_4657\"\/Brand looked at the lap board in amazement: \u2018It says a lot about the level\u2019The women had really picked up the pace, causing Brand to look at the lap counter in surprise during the race. <\/p>\n

\u201cMarie (Schreiber, ed.) set a good pace\u2014that certainly wasn\u2019t easy. Then I heard the announcer say we had to do six laps; that\u2019s never really happened before in the women\u2019s race, and it says a lot about the level of competition.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Koppenbergcross is the first race in the X2O standings, which Brand now logically leads.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a tough classification. Sometime in February, every second can count, so you always have to keep pushing, even in a race like this. You can pace yourself a little differently if time doesn\u2019t matter. Today, it was tougher than tough.\u201d<\/p>\n

And when the going gets tough, the 37-year-old cyclocross rider often rises to the occasion. In the cycling town of Oudenaarde, this marked her second victory on the famous cobblestone climb in the Belgian Ardennes. \u201cHave I come to love this climb? It\u2019s always painful, but I\u2019ve always loved it, yes.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Once again, Lucinda Brand has demonstrated her strength in cyclocross. The Dutch rider from Baloise-Het Poetsbureau Lions proved…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":949070,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,124089,301239,166194,85,23293],"class_list":["post-949069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-cyclocross","tag-latest-cycling-news","tag-lucinda-brand","tag-sports","tag-womens-cycling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/949069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=949069"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/949069\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/949070"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=949069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=949069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=949069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}