January 2010
Championships
The 2010 cyclo-cross world championships have taken place in Tabor and the Luxemburgish riders all performed well on the icy course near the Czech town.
Results:
|
| world championships Tabor
|
|
|
Zdenek Stybar
28th at 3'42"
|
| | | |
Next to the outstanding 17th place of junior Bob Jungels, Jempy Drucker's performance in the elite race also was one of the highlights of the week-end. The rider of the ACC Contern hasn't reached his own, fairly high goal of a Top 25 placing, but with the 28th place at the finish and less than 4 minutes down on winner Zdenek Stybar, Jempy has impressed everybody. And he had to fight hard all the race to achieve this result, against some famous riders like defending champion Niels Albert, totally out of contention for the win on a course that didn't suit him at all, or against Kevin Pauwels, the brilliant winner of Zolder a few weeks ago.
Drucker had a brilliant start, moving up from position 35 on the start line to the 20th spot in the first lap and he found himself in a group with Italian champion Enrico Franzoi, with Ondrej Bambula, second in the Grand-prix de la Commune de Contern at the beginning of the season, Swiss rider Flückiger, Italian Bianco, former three times world champion Erwin Verwecken, Czech rider Martin Bina and Frenchman Nicolas Bazin. The two latter were really strong today and moved up gradually to the front on the next two laps. At the head of the race, big favourite Zdenek Stybar made a very strong impression, taking with him riders like Vantornout, Nys, Mourey, Chainel, De Knegt or the other home rider, Simunek. Just like Swiss Christian Heule, Simunek junior animated the race for a few laps, before the other favourites took over. Towards mid-race, Zdenek Stybar accelerated and it became soon clear that he was the strongest today. Nobody was able to follow the Czech rider who created a gap of about half a minute on Nys, Vantornout, Mourey and Bina, who had bridged up from behind. Jempy Drucker also rode consistently during this time and he maintained himself inside the third group of the race, a group that had swallowed up riders like Page, Dlask, Aernouts, Albert or Ausbuher in the meantime. It was only in the last two laps that Jempy faded a little bit and after one hour and twelve minutes (!) of racing, he crossed the finish line in 28th position, behind Italian rider Fabio Ursi and ahead of Ausbuher and Page. Three minutes and a half earlyer, Zdenek Stybar has finished the race as the big winner of the day, snatching his third title as world champion, the first in the elite category. Klaas Vantornout also arrived solo, taking second place around 20 seconds late, whereas Sven Nys had to rely on his sprint to take the better of the surprising Martin Bina for the bronze medal. The other Luxemburgish rider in the race, Gusty Bausch, also showed a solid performance by taking 40th postion despite a hard crash in lap four of the race.
The last line for the preparation of the world championships in Tabor has begun and for Jempy Drucker, it involves the participation in the two world-cup events of Roubaix, in France and Hoogerheide, in the Netherlands.
Résultats:
|
| world-cup Roubaix
|
|
|
Zdenek Stybar
33rd at 6'22"
|
| world-cup Hoogerheide
|
|
|
Niels Albert
37th at 4'34"
|
| | | | | |
After the National championships, Jempy had a very hard training week on his program and the expectations for the race on and around the famous velodrome in Rouvaix were rather low. The legs were sore and on the tough and muddy course, Drucker couldn’t avoid a gap of more than 6 minutes to ghe best riders. He finished the race in 33rd place, 20 seconds behind Frenchman Laurent Colombatto and ahead of Danish champion Joachim Parbo. Riders like Chicosz, Derepas or Van Leeuwen who are normally of the same level than Jempy Drucker finished more than a minute ahead of him in this difficult race. The winner of the day is called Zdenek Stybar and the young rider scored double today since he took also over the overall lead in the world-cup series from Niels Albert, who was handicapped by a broken rib. However, it didn’t start too well for Stybar who had trouble to hang on to the leading group in the first part of the race. Towards mid-race, the Czech champion managed to move up to the head of the race and immediately attacked together with his team-mate Bart Wellens. During the 7th lap, “Stybbi” was able to create a gap and he remained in the lead until the end, when he took the flowers 8 seconds ahead of Klaas Vantornout and 16 seconds ahead of Sven Nys. In fourth position, Erwin
|
Niels Albert, Zdenek Stybar
|
Verwecken shows that his form is pointing seriously upwards, just at the right time for what will probably be his very last world championships. In Hoogerheide, Niels Albert took a solo win ahead of Zdenek Stybar, just like 12 month ago when he was able to snatch the world champion title in this same location. But the young Belgian had to fight very hard for the win and it was only when Stybar slipped away on a corner in the last lap that he was able to take off for the win. The two of them were leading the race together with Kevin Pauwels, since one of the numerous accelerations of Niels Albert had eliminated the likes of Vantornout, Nys, Verwecken, De Knegt or Jonathan Page from the battle for the win. With his second place today, Zdenek Stybar secured the overall win in the world cup series.
For Jempy Drucker, the goal today was to score a maximum of points in this series, in order to avoid a bad start position in the upcoming world championships. But he didn't succeed that well because his 37th place of today won't move him up a lot in the world rankings. However, he did ride well today since he was less than 5 minutes late on the best riders at the end of the day. He finished the race together with Kamil Ausbuher, winner of the Grand-prix de la Commune de Contern at the beginning of the season and with Bram Schmitz, winner of a stage in the Tour of Luxemburg several years ago.
January is the month of the National and the World-Championships and of course, those two races are Jempy Drucker's main goals for the winter season.
Results:
|
| Cyclo-cross Tervuren
|
|
|
Zdenek Stybar
21st at 3'34"
|
| Luxemburg Nationals
|
|
|
Jempy Drucker
winner
|
| | | | | |
But before that, he lined up in the Tervuren cyclo-cross, in the suburbs of Brussels,
|
Zdenek Stybar, Jempy Drucker
|
and took a very respectfull 21st place there, only 3 minutes and a half behind winner Zdenek Stybar. On a course that was very fast, though covered by snow, Jempy had to battle hard against the young generation of cyclo-cross since the U23-riders also took part in the race and with no less than six of them in the Top 20, among them a very strong Tom Meeusen in 4th place ahead of world champion Niels Albert, they showed that the level in that category is very high. Besides the well known Walsleben, Zlamalik or Ben Berden, Drucker today rode together with riders like the former junior world champion Arnaud Jouffroy, like former European champion Lubomir Petrus or the actual European champion Robert Gavenda. Like usual, Jempy tried to come to the front as fast as possible and showed some very strong laps at the beginning of the race, the third one being his fastest of the whole race, before fading a little bit in the second half of the race and losing a few places. He nearly took his first Top 20 placing in a very big race but in the end, Jempy was noted in 21st place, sandwiched by Gavenda and Petrus, 3'34" down on another East-European rider, Zdenek Stybar. The Czech champion broke away shortly after half race and he resisted to Niels Albert and Sven Nys until the end. In a final with lots of suspense, the world champion barely bridged up to Stybar before falling back again after a mechanical problem. Sven Nys, on his side, had a small off-moment before coming up very strongly at the end. During his last lap, the fastest of all, he came closer and closer to Zdenek Stybar but he came a little bit too short, having to settle down with second place at the end.
The Luxemburgish National championships organized by the LG Alzingen
took place on Jempy Druckers training course on Holleschbierg in Hesperange, a place where the native of the near village of Sandweiler knows every up and down, every turn and trap. A good reason for him to be very motivated, even more because he was not able to defend his chances in Dippach last year after the nasty crash in Loenhout. And Drucker tested his rivals as of the first lap and soon he had a gap on the next chasers, U23 rider Pit Schlechter and Gusty Bausch. But defending champion Bausch, who is always at his ease on frozen and slippery courses like this one, didn't give up and stayed in touch with race-favourite Drucker. After half of the race, the latter only had about 20 seconds advantage on the strong riding man from LC Kayl, while Pit Schlechter had lost some ground in the meantime. But then, a small incident showed that the victory of Drucker wasn't secured yet. Indeed, he had a small crash and also lost one of his eye-lenses. Gusty Bausch suddenly was only a few meters late on the leader, who had to slow down due to a lack of clear sight. Fortunately, he knew the course very well and was able to hold a small gap, driving into the last lap with four seconds advantage on Bausch. Of course, the crowds were happy to have some suspense until the very end with the over-motivated defending champion chasing very hard, cheered on by his devoted fan-club. Finally, Jempy Drucker was able to keep a very small advantage of only two seconds and took the National title ahead of Gusty Bausch. After a very bad start, the exceptionnal Pascal Triebel moved up throught the field during the race and with a strong final, he was able at 43 years of age to take the bronze medal, a good two minutes behind the two leaders. With a nice third place in the scratch rankings, Pit Schlechter took a deserved win in the U23 category ahead of Vincent Dias Dos Santos.
Note: "This site contains links to other Internet pages, on which content and presentation we don't have any influence. These refences are indicated merely for your information and and we can't be made reliable for any of the content of any of the Internet pages our links may take you to."
|
