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Van Vleuten is the 2017 elite women’s time trial champion, Canuel 21st

British Junior cyclocross world champion Tom Pidcock adds Jr. chrono gold to cabinet

September 19, 2017
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The first Dutch winner of the elite women’s time trial world champion in four years is Annamiek van Vleuten, who took Tuesday’s victory at the Bergen 2017 UCI Road World Championships. Van Vleuten’s compatriot Anna van der Breggen earned the silver. Thomas Pidcock showed why he is the hottest prospect in pro cycling as he added a Junior chrono champion jersey to the rainbow stripe kit he won in February’s world cyclocross championships.


Both the elite women and Junior men rode the same 21-km course. It was another route to include the challenge of the Berglundsbakken climb in the middle of the smaller, southern lap.


Pidcock, who also took this year’s Junior version of Paris-Roubaix, negotiated the course in 28:02 for an average of 45.161-km/h. He beat Italian Antonio Puppio by 12-seconds; Puppio gave his nation its third medal of Bergen 2017. Pole Filip Maciejuk was one second off of silver. Charles-etienne Chretien was Canada’s top rider in 28th.


Pidcock will be riding ‘cross for Sven Nys’s Telenet-Fidea Lions team this season and will reportedly be joining Team Wiggins to race the road next season.

Dutch rider Anna van der Breggen, the Olympic road race champion and 2017 Women’s WorldTour title holder, was the second to roll the elite women’s race, and her 29:02.51 stood for a long time. She had the advantage of her effort being made on dry surfaces.

The athlete to start first, Laura Stephens of the U.S.A. was 1:08 back.

Karol-Ann Canuel was in the final 15 riders and the road on the southern loop was sodden by the time she got underway.


The rain wasn’t deterring van der Breggen’s compatriot van Vleuten who, 12-seconds faster, nudged van der Breggen off the hot seat. Van Vleuten recovered from her horrifying Olympic road race crash last summer to finish second to van der Breggen in the Women’s WorldTour, winning La Course by le Tour de France and the Holland Ladies Tour along the way.


With two-time and reigning champion Amber Neben (U.S.A.) yet to start, the top-3 was van Vleuten, van der Breggen and Chloe Dygart, another American.


Neben wasn’t killing it out on the course, holding only the 27th fastest time after the first intermediate check. Dygart’s bronze was in trouble as Australian Katrin Garfoot was flying. Garfoot took the medal, her second consecutive elite women’s time trial bronze.

Canuel was 21st, 2:18 back. Neben placed 11th.

Bergen 2017 Road World Championships Junior Men’s time trial
Gold) Thomas Pidcock (Great Britain)
Silver) Antonio Puppio (Italy) +0:12
Bronze) Filip Maciejuk (Poland) +0:13
28) Charles-etienne Chretien (Canada) +1:31
62) Graydon Staples (Canada) +3:01

Bergen 2017 Road World Championships Elite women’s time trial
Gold) Annemiek van Vleuten (The Netherlands) 28:50
Silver) Anna van der Breggen (the Netherlands) +0:12
Bronze) Katrin Garfoot (Australia) +0:18
21) Karol-Ann Canuel (Canada) +2:18