There was no mistaking Lotte Kopecky’s frustration. The Belgian had come toward the line at the UCI Road World Championships in a seemingly perfect position as key sprint rivals like Elisa Balsamo (Italy) and Marianne Vos (Netherlands) had been dropped, and given the composition of the lead group of 12 Kopecky had every reason to think she’d have the upper hand in the sprint.
And she did, but it turned out not to be a sprint for victory. An injured Annemiek van Vleuten (Netherlands), who had taken up domestique duties unexpectedly, stole the show when she crossed the line for victory just ahead of Kopecky after launching a late attack and only just holding off the sprinting group. As Van Vleuten crossed the line with disbelief written all over her face, Kopecky was just behind in second, banging the bars in frustration.
“It’s a little painful actually,” Kopecky told a post-race media conference. “If you are so close to the world title then second is not enough.”
After a powerful season start – moving from a tenacious victory over Van Vleuten at Strade Bianche to a Tour of Flanders win, a Vuelta a Burgos stage and a Belgian title – Kopecky’s steady flow of firsts came to a halt. There were still podiums aplenty but the top step was missing, perhaps making that silver in the 164.3km road race that much harder to take.
Kopecky had in fact wondered for a while if she should even come to the Road World Championships, having pulled out of the Belgian team after a Tour de France Femmes where she felt ‘super bad’. But after a rest and evident revival in form at the European track championships – where she took gold in both the points and the elimination race – she put her hand up for Worlds again.
With the 26-year-old’s combination of sprint and climbing prowess the course, which delivered 2,433 metres of elevation gain, looked to be perfectly suited to Kopecky, especially with the short and sharp Mt Pleasant climb of the city circuit, repeated six times, bound to shed many of the fast finishers and leave her to take advantage.
Plus, for the first time ever Kopecky had decided to take on the worlds time trial, with a solid ninth a promising sign for her form ahead of the road race, where Van Vleuten’s attack caught everyone by surprise.
“Annemiek just picked the perfect moment and I think not only myself but the others just made a mistake,” said Kopecky. “We didn’t react immediately but she came with speed from behind and it was just a very smart and quick attack.”
