Lucinda Brand beats Ceylin Alvarado after a nice battle in Superprestige Diegem

Lucinda Brand ‘finally’ knows what winning is again. The Dutch champion has always missed out on victory in her past seven crosses, but soloed to victory in the evening cross of Diegem on Monday. After a nice battle, Brand defeated her compatriot Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado. Inge van der Heijden came third.

During the busy Christmas and New Year period, the crosses follow each other in rapid succession. On Sunday, most cyclo-cross riders rode in Besançon, France for the World Cup, and a day later Diegem, Belgium, was the setting for the characteristic evening cross.

Among the elite women, not all top performers were ready to leave. World champion Fem van Empel has never raced in Diegem and was again conspicuous by her absence this year. Furthermore, it was also a futile search for Puck Pieterse. The Fenix-Deceuninck rider – who won the last two editions of the evening cross – had to drop out of the Superprestige cyclo-cross due to illness.

Alvarado and Brand cross swords
But don’t worry: with Superprestige leader Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado, Dutch champion Lucinda Brand and Inge van der Heijden, there were still plenty of great names at the start. After a nervous and chaotic start – several riders crashed – four riders managed to break away early: Alvarado, Brand, Leonie Bentveld and French champion Hélène Clauzel.

Not much later, the wheat was separated from the chaff again, thanks to Alvarado. The Fenix-Deceuninck rider was clearly keen on sporting revenge after her poorer performance in the Besançon World Cup and already shook the tree in the first round. The Dutch woman opened a small gap and started the second round with a few leads, but after a slip and a bike change everything had to be done again.

Evenly matched
After just ten minutes of racing, only three riders – Alvarado, Brand and Inge van der Heijden – were eligible for victory. After Alvarado’s first pinprick, Brand saw her moment to get things going. With some sharp accelerations and good sand passages she put her two compatriots under pressure, but the sharp Alvarado did not flinch. Van der Heijden had more difficulty following, but managed to get back on track with character.

Yet this turned out to be a harbinger for the second half of the cross. Van der Heijden had to show his colors every time when Brand or Alvarado threw the bat into the fowl’s cage. In the fourth lap, the Crelan-Corendon rider went overboard – after a new acceleration of the pace from Alvarado. And so in the last two rounds we could prepare for the expected battle between Alvarado and Brand, not entirely coincidentally also the numbers one and two in the Superprestige standings.

Finally scored again for Brand
In recent races, Brand often had to acknowledge her superiority in the fast and explosive Alvarado and therefore decided not to wait for the final round. The Dutch champion managed to pull away meter by meter at a suffocating pace from Alvarado, who proved unable to respond. Brand grew wings again, appeared to be unleashed and continued to deepen her lead. Going into the last lap, the difference had already increased to twelve seconds.

Brand turned out to be a badass, did not make any more mistakes in the final round and recorded her first victory since December 1, when she was the best in the Dublin World Cup. The battle-weary Alvarado crossed the line in second, thus limiting the damage with a view to the overall victory in the Superprestige, although the difference between the two cyclocross fighters is only one point in Alvarado’s favor. Van der Heijden had to deal with chain problems in the final phase, but finished third.