Koller wins junior women's cross country mountain bike world championship

Race Results
By , published

Switzerland adds two more medals to its tally

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Malene Degn (Denmark) opens a gap(Image credit: Tour of Japan)

Nicole Koller won a gold medal for Switzerland in the junior women's cross country race at the UCI Mountain Bike World Championships on Thursday in Hafjell, Norway. Koller finished the four-lap race on a bright and sunny day ahead of Denmark's Malene Degn and another Swiss rider, Sina Frei.

"To me it was a good race," said Koller. "I had a strong fight with Nicole. We battled the whole race."

Degn set the early fast pace, followed closely by the Czech Republic's Barbora Prudkova and last year's junior women's world champion Alessandra Keller (Swizterland).

"All year I had bad starts and today it was important for me to get a good start," said Degn.

Meanwhile, Koller steadily worked her way up from her 15th place starting spot toward the front, and she was within sight of Degn by the end of the first lap. She chased the Dane with her teammate Frei.

"The first part of the race I was in the back, and I had to fight forward to make it up to Marlene," said Koller.

Prudkova fell back several places toward the end of the first lap.

On the second lap, Degn and Koller were together, marking each other while Keller and Frei chased them.

It wasn't until the end of lap three that Koller was able to get a slight gap on Degn, but from then on, she extended her lead, riding in solo for the gold medal 1:19 ahead of Degn in second.

Degn said, "I could feel that she was stronger than me on the uphills, so I had a hard time. On the last lap, she got a gap that I couldn't close, but silver is good enough for me."

"I realized my advantage on the downhill on the last lap," said Koller. "I got 30 seconds, and then I just had to look out that I didn't crash or have any problems."

Last year's world champion Keller faded a bit near the end of the race as Frei powered to a bronze medal. Keller was fourth ahead of Prudkova, who seemed to recover toward the end of the race.

Satisfied with her bronze medal, Frei said, "It's amazing - a dream come true. I don't have any words to describe this."

Full results

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Junior women
#Rider Name (Country) TeamResult
1Nicole Koller (Switzerland)1:06:16
2Malene Degn (Denmark)0:01:06
3Sina Frei (Switzerland)0:01:27
4Alessandra Keller (Switzerland)0:01:49
5Barbora Prudkova (Czech Republic)0:02:10
6Evie Richards (Great Britain)0:03:00
7Isla Short (Great Britain)0:04:51
8Chiara Teocchi (Italy)0:05:51
9Marlena Drozdziok (Poland)0:05:52
10Greta Seiwald (Italy)0:06:13
11Antonia Daubermann (Germany)0:06:39
12Marine Lewis (Canada)0:07:05
13Ffion James (Great Britain)0:07:26
14Tatiana Kuznetcova (Russian Federation)0:07:31
15Marit Sveen (Norway)0:08:04
16Jana Czeczinkarova (Czech Republic)0:09:02
17Aline Seitz (Switzerland)0:09:16
18Laure Souty (France)0:10:14
19Nadja Heigl (Austria)0:10:39
20Marlo Koevoet (Netherlands)0:11:03
21Harriet Beaven (New Zealand)0:12:12
22Cléa Cochelin (France)0:12:48
23Anna Gabrielsen (Norway)0:12:57
24Marina Semenova (Russian Federation)0:13:07
25Lisa Neumuller (Germany)0:13:32
26Frances Du Toit (South Africa)0:13:38
27Ksenia Lepikhina (United States Of America)0:14:33
28Soren Meeuwisse (Canada)0:15:28
29Laurie Arseneault (Canada)0:17:00
30Meda Petrusauskaite (Lithuania)0:18:40
31Shea Chavez (United States Of America)0:22:09
-1lapPatrycja Piotrowska (Poland)Row 31 - Cell 2
-1lapAna Sofia Silvestre (Portugal)Row 32 - Cell 2
-1lapMegan Williams (Australia)Row 33 - Cell 2
-1lapBrenda Santoyo (Mexico)Row 34 - Cell 2
-1lapPaige Foxcroft (Canada)Row 35 - Cell 2
-1lapDayana Gilliant Garcia Garcia (Mexico)Row 36 - Cell 2
DNFBianca Haw (South Africa)Row 37 - Cell 2
DNFEllie Wale (Australia)Row 38 - Cell 2
DNSSarah Bauer (Germany)Row 39 - Cell 2
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Nations
#Rider Name (Country) TeamResultHeader Cell - Column 3
1Switzerland112pts
2Great Britain94Row 1 - Cell 3
3Italy62Row 2 - Cell 3
4Czech Republic59Row 3 - Cell 3
5Canada51Row 4 - Cell 3
6Germany44Row 5 - Cell 3
7Russian Federation42Row 6 - Cell 3
8Norway42Row 7 - Cell 3
9France40Row 8 - Cell 3
10Poland39Row 9 - Cell 3
11Denmark38Row 10 - Cell 3
12United States of America22Row 11 - Cell 3
13Austria21Row 12 - Cell 3
14Netherlands20Row 13 - Cell 3
15New Zealand19Row 14 - Cell 3
16South Africa14Row 15 - Cell 3
17Lithuania10Row 16 - Cell 3
18Mexico8Row 17 - Cell 3
19Portugal7Row 18 - Cell 3
20Australia6Row 19 - Cell 3

 

Sue George

Sue George is an editor at Cyclingnews.  She coordinates all of the site's mountain bike race coverage and assists with the road, 'cross and track coverage.

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