Paulina Rooijakkers (Canyon-SRAM) wins women's Gravel One Fifty(Image credit: Smildafotografie.nl)
Women’s podium: winner Paulina Rooijakkers (Canyon-SRAM), Carolin Schiff second and Moniek Tenniglo third.(Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Men’s podium: winner Sam Gademan (Allinq Continental Cycling), Jonas Lindberg second, and Piotr Havik third(Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Winner Sam Gademan (Allinq Continental Cycling) at the finish line(Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Future winner Sam Gademan takes the lead right from the start. (Image credit: Smildafotografie.nl)
Jonas Lindberg followed by two riders including Sam Gademan. (Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Thijs Koops is a second ahead of the peloton in 4th place at 16km.(Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Moniek Tenninglo at the front of the peloton, including Marianne Vos among others. (Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Passage of the leading group at 50km, near Westervelde. (Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Gravel One Fifty(Image credit: smildafotografie.nl)
Dutch riders Paulina Rooijakkers (Canyon-SRAM) and Sam Gademan (Allinq Continental Cycling) won Gravel One Fifty on home soil Saturday. The race across northern Netherlands is one of the original events on the UCI Gravel World Series, which began last year.
Rooijakkers, fresh off a 12th-place finish on GC at Giro d’Italia Donne, took an early solo lead over defending champion Carolin Schiff and continued to gain time at each checkpoint to finish the 150km route in 4:32:33. Schiff finished six minutes and 14 seconds back in second place.
Marianne Vos went head-to-head in a finish sprint against Dutch compatriot Moniek Tenniglo, with Tenniglo grabbing the final podium spot for women.
In the men’s category, Gademan outsprinted Jonas Lindberg, who was one second back. The duo matched each other at all four checkpoints in the race, with the Dutch 22-year-old surging at the line to finish in 4:12:05, one second ahead of the Dane.
Retired pro road cyclist Piotr Havik, who was third in the race last year, worked his way back from a two-minute deficit in the early segments and crossed the line shortly after the leading duo for a repeat of third. The trio swept both the overall podium and the male 19-34 age category top three.
This year’s 150km flat route began in Roden, a new location at the border of the three northern provinces of The Netherlands (Groningen, Friesland and Drenthe). It featured just 267m of elevation, with a track meandering through several small villages across a mix of dirt roads, gravel roads and grass sections.
A total of 1,316 riders from 25 different countries registered for the two ride options at the event, including a shorter 80km race, and it delivered a third sold-out stop for the UCI Gravel World Series this season.
Among the notable Dutch riders in the men’s field included Ryan Kamp in sixth, Thomas Mein in 12th, Joris Nieuwenhuis 13th, Michael Vanthourenhout 14th, Eli Iserbyt 16th. In the field for women from the Netherlands were Tessa Neefjes in seventh and Manon Bakker in 17th.
Four events in the 2023 UCI Gravel World Series remain before the UCI Gravel World Championships on October 7-8 in Veneto, Italy. The next event takes place July 22 in Poland, Gravel Adventure.
Jackie has been involved in professional sports for more than 30 years in news reporting, sports marketing and public relations. She founded Peloton Sports in 1998, a sports marketing and public relations agency, which managed projects for Tour de Georgia, Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah and USA Cycling. She also founded Bike Alpharetta Inc, a Georgia non-profit to promote safe cycling. She is proud to have worked in professional baseball for six years - from selling advertising to pulling the tarp for several minor league teams. She has climbed l'Alpe d'Huez three times (not fast). Her favorite road and gravel rides are around horse farms in north Georgia (USA) and around lavender fields in Provence (France), and some mtb rides in Park City, Utah (USA).
