Following Australia’s Grace Brown, who successfully defended her Olympic title to win the women’s event, Belgium’s Remco Evenepoel defeated Italy’s Filippo Ganna to capture the world road time trial title and round off a spectacular summer.
Roaring over the 46km route on his golden bike, the 24-year-old Evenepoel—who won the time trial and road race at this year’s Olympics in Paris—took the lead by six seconds.
Evenepoel had enough left in him to hold off former world champion Ganna for a little while longer before raising his arms in victory and adding another win to his record. After winning the event, the athlete declared: “I felt pretty good at the start and then had a bit of a difficult moment on the climb… It was maybe the most difficult time trial of my life. But in the end we won.”
Meanwhile Brown said that she will be retiring from the sport following the road race the following week, but not before putting on a spectacular display to win the elusive double. The 32-year-old accomplished a first for riders in men’s and women’s racing history when she won both the Olympic and world titles in the same year. Soon after, the powerful Evenepoel did the same.
At the second checkpoint on the 29.9-kilometer course, Brown was trailing Dutch rider Demi Vollering; however, she executed a spectacular comeback to win by 17 seconds.
She declared: “Honestly it feels like I’m in a dream these last couple of months… These big goals seem ambitious but I’ve been able to get out on the road and realize those dreams so it’s been cool… I’m still finishing up at the end of this season and I just feel really, really lucky to have the end of my career like this. It’s special.”
Source: CNA