November 7/21 12:03 pm - Mitchell & Coles-Lyster Win at Opening Round of Champions League

Posted by Editoress on 11/7/21
 

The first round of the new UCI Champions League took place on Saturday in Mallorca, and Canadians had a strong showing, winning two of the eight events - Kelsey Mitchell in women's Keirin and Maggie Coles-Lyster in the women's Scratch Race. In an unexpected (and pleasant) surprise, Canadian viewers were able to watch the action for free on CBC Sports Online - no word on whether this will continue in the following rounds, but let's hope so.

Overall, the racing was closer than expected, with a few upsets, however, for the most part, the top riders prevailed. The presentation was marred by numerous production errors - misspelled names, wrong results posted, no explanations for officials' rulings on things like relegations and long awkward delays. Overall, it felt amateurish at times - hopefully, this was first outing teething problems.

Canada had riders in three of the four categories - women's Sprint and Endurance, and men's Sprint. Here are the particulars:

Women's Keirin & Sprint
The 18 riders, including Canada's Mitchell and Lauriane Genest, raced in three opening heats of the Keirin, with the top two in each moving on to the Final. The format was changed slightly from usual, with the lead derny bike only doing two laps (instead of three) before pulling off. Mitchell easily won her qualifier, and Genest finished second in hers, but was then dropped to last, with no explanation by either the announcers or in the results (where she is sixth rather than relegated). It appears she was relegated for riding the Cote d'Azur (blue band) - too low on the track. That's fine, but at least let us know!

In the Final, Mitchell was up against the powerhouse Germans - Emma Hinze and Sophie Lea Friedrich - plus Martha Bayona (Colombia), Mathilde Gros (France) and Miriam Vece (Italy). Mitchell dropped all the way to the back after the derny pulled off and looked to be out of contention until the final lap, when she made an incredible surge up to the front to beat Hinze.

Kelsey Mitchell winning the Keirin   Photos SWpix.com

"First round was pretty amazing!," said Mitchell. "The racing was great and the atmosphere was so cool. Track cycling is a very spectator friendly sport and I think the Champions League is doing everything right and showing spectators exactly what they want to see! I am happy with my racing and excited to finally walk away with a win in the Keirin. Excited to keep this momentum going towards Lithuania."

Hinze and Friedrich race for gold  Photos SWpix.com

The Sprint featured three-up racing for a first round with the top rider in each of the six heats moving on and then two Semi-finals of three riders, with the winners moving on to a more traditional head-to-head Final. Not too surprisingly, we saw the same outcome as at the world championships last month - Hinze and Friedrich raced for gold, with Hinze winning. Both Mitchell and Genest finished second in their respective semi-finals (just like at Worlds), with Mitchell ranked third overall and Genest fourth. There is no explanation for this ranking, since there was no qualifying 200m or anything else that ranked Mitchell ahead of Genest.

In the overall standings after Round 1, Hinze leads with 37 points, followed by Kelsey Mitchell at 35. Genest is ninth with 13 points after receiving no points for the Keirin.

Women's Scratch Race & Elimination
Other than being extremely short - half normal length at only 20 laps/5 kilometres - the Scratch remained the same; first past the finish line wins. The big names - particularly Katie Archibald (Great Britain) and Kirsten Wild (Netherlands) - seem so intent on watching each other than it allowed three riders to roll away off the front with no chasing. Coles-Lyster (who started the break), Olivija Baleisyte (Lithuania) and Hanna Tserakh (Belarus) got as much as half a lap before Archibald began to chase them down. Coles-Lyster went to the front with a lap and a half to go, towing the other two around and holding off the chase.

Maggie Coles-Lyster wins the Scratch Race  Photos SWpix.com

"Tonight was the first night of the Champions League and what an epic night it was!," said Coles-Lyster. "Winning the first ever Scratch Race of the Champions League was such an incredible way kick it off. I knew I had that win in me, but to actually execute it is a whole other thing that I am so proud of. I attacked pretty early on, with something like 15 laps to go, and two other girls bridged up to me and we worked together. Eventually we had about half a lap going into about three laps to go and then they started chasing. We managed to hold them off - I totally thought they were going to come over us but with about 50 metres to go I was still at the front, and I thought, 'No, they can't come over me now, I'm too close to the end!'. I ended up sixth in the Elimination; a tough race so I'm pretty happy with that as well. So now I'm sitting second overall and I can't wait for Lithuania in a couple of weeks."

Katie Archibald  Photos SWpix.com

The Elimination was the one event that had no changes from its traditional format. Here, Coles-Lyster finished sixth, while Archibald beat Wild for the win. Archibald - after finishing fourth in the Scratch - leads the overall standings with 33 points, followed by Coles-Lyster at 30 points.

Men's Sprint and Keirin
This was expected to be an all Dutch competition again, between the two dominant men - Harrie Lavreysen and Jeffrey Hoogland. However, there were some upsets. Lavreysen won the Sprint, as expected, but the exciting young Russian rider, Mikhail Iakovlev took second after beating Hoogland in the semi-final. In the Keirin, Germany's Stefan Botticher jumped to an early lead in the Final, holding off Lavreysen at the line. Lavreysen leads with 37 points, followed by Botticher at 33 and Hoogland at 30 points. Canadian entrant Hugo Barrette went out in the first round of the Sprint, but made it into the Final of the Keirin after finishing second in his first race. In the Final he finished fifth, and is tenth overall with 11 points.

Men's Scratch Race & Elimination
This was the one segment where there was one clear dominant rider - Corbin Strong of New Zealand won both races and was very much in charge. So, he has the maximum 40 points. Iuri Lettao (Portugal), with a second and a fourth is second overall with 30 points, and the young American rider, Gavin Hoover, had a very strong showing, finishing sixth in the Scratch and fourth in the Elimination, to sit third overall with 27 points.

Corbin Strong of New Zealand won both races  Photos SWpix.com

Results