Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (France) claimed a crushing victory in the elite women’s cross country race at the Mountain Bike World Championships in Glentress Forest, taking gold ahead of her compatriot Loana Lecomte.
Already winner of the short track event earlier in the week, Ferrand-Prévot completed the double with consummate ease, catching and passing Lecomte on the second lap and stretching out her advantage inexorably thereafter.
It was Ferrand-Prévot’s second successive short track-cross country double at the Worlds, and it was her fifth XCC world title in total after previous triumphs in 2015, 2019, 2020 and 2022.
Lecomte came home in second, 1:14 behind Ferrand-Prévot, while Puck Pieterse (Netherlands) overcame Mona Mitterwallner (Austria) in a gripping duel for the bronze medal.
“I’m feeling very happy. It was a super hard race, I didn’t have a good start but I wanted to keep my own pace during all the race,” Ferrand-Prévot said. “It’s what I did – full gas on the uphill and then I tried to recover on the downhill and it worked out perfectly. I’m really proud of myself because I kept my plan even though I didn’t have a good start. I just said: ‘I have one mission today and I have to reach it.’”
Ferrand-Prévot had a surprisingly slow start and she came through the opening section with work to do in 12th place.
Lecomte led through the opening lap followed closely by Puck Pieterse (Netherlands), with Jolanda Neff (Switzerland), Evi Richards (Great Britain) and Alessandra Keller (Switzerland) close behind.
Ferrand-Prévot made her way quickly into fourth wheel while Sina Frei (Switzerland) used an alternate line to power past into sixth wheel by the first split.
Lecomte opened up a gap to Pieterse on the rocky descent that followed and had a 15-second gap over Pieterse and Ferrand-Prévot at the next check.
Ferrand-Prévot made a move to get across to her compatriot on the next climb and she was only five seconds behind at the end of lap 1, with Keller and Pieterse at 11 seconds. The defending champion quickly caught and overtook Lecomte to take the lead just 17 minutes into the race.
By lap 2, Ferrand-Prévot’s exhibition through Glentress Forest continued as she opened a 14-second gap on Lecomte, with Pieterse falling further behind in third at 33 seconds, with Keller hot on her heels.
Behind, Richards was making her bid for the medals after joining Pieterse and Keller and going straight over the top of them.
Lecomte continued to hold off the chasers and could not catch her flying teammate, and the fight behind for the bronze medal intensified with Keller and Pieterse dropping Richards.
Opting for a hardtail bike, Ferrand-Prévot managed her advantage on the downhill sections and then continued to stretch out her lead every time the track climbed, grinding a big gear as she made light work of the inclines.
By the end of lap four, Ferrand-Prévot held a lead of 41 seconds over Lecomte, with Keller, Pieterse and Richards trailing by 1:30, and the Frenchwoman never looked in any danger over the remaining three laps as she cruised to a dominant victory.
When Ferrand-Prévot took the bell, she had over a minute in hand on Lecomte, while Mitterwallner had battled her way back up to the chasers and then seized the initiative in the race for bronze.
Only Pieterse could track the Austrian when she accelerated into the final lap. At that juncture, it looked as though Mitterwallner was destined to take bronze, but she ran out of steam in the closing stages and Pieterse emerged to claim the third step of the podium.
“At the moment it just hurts, there was nothing left in me at the end,” Mitterwallner said. “My start was not good enough, I am not aggressive enough to push ahead of riders, so I have to work on that. I really wanted that bronze medal bad but it was just not enough at the end.”
Pieterse, for her part, said that she overhauled Mitterwallner "on character" but she paid tribute to the collective might of the French gold and silver medallists. "They were so strong, I think they had areally good tactic and they anticipated really well my start tactics," she said. "They were just on another level today."
Lecomte, meanwhile, knew from the moment Ferrand-Prévot caught her that silver would be the summit of her ambition.
"It was the strategy to have a very fast start, and after I did my own race - my own pace. In the technical and physical parts I'm very happy with my result and all the results of the French team," he said. "Pauline was very strong and we have different qualitites. She was strong again today and I have no regret."
The day – and the week – belonged to Ferrand-Prévot, who admitted that she had not been immediately enamoured by the course when she first saw it last weekend.
“For sure, when I came last Saturday we went to look at the lap and I said, ‘Oh, I really don’t like it.’ I didn’t feel good,” she said. “Sometimes you have a feeling about the lap, and that day I didn’t feel it was for me but all the week I tried to work mentally and just take it day by day. today I felt ok, not super, but like I said, I was on a mission. I just wanted to go full gas and see the result at the end.”
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