The kick-off for the international ’cross season with World Cup races in Las Vegas and Iowa City/Iowa brought the first victory and some podium places for the Belgian pro teams riding STEVENS Super Prestige bikes.

Laurens Sweeck of ERA-Circus demonstrated great early season form in the first two races – September 21st in Las Vegas and September 24th in Iowa City – riding his STEVENS Super Prestige to a third place in each race. David van der Poel of Beobank-Corendon wins the UCI race in Iowa City on September 25th.

Cross Vegas
At the ”Cross Vegas” a mass crash shortly after the start shook up the field quite a bit. Philipp Walsleben for example suddenly found himself at the end of the field. The German Champion of team Beobank-Corendon then went on a chase on his STEVENS Super Prestige to eventually finish as best German in 8th place.

Meanwhile at the front of the race Michael Vanthourenhout and Laurens Sweeck together with several other Belgian top riders were very active. In the middle of the race Wout van Aert crashed near the obstacles after the first half of the race had been dictated by tactics. Van Aert dropped back to 20th place but worked himself back to the front.

He took advantage of his opponents’ reluctance by setting the decisive attack in the sand section. In the sprint of the chasing field Laurens Sweeck was awarded for his active riding style with a third place behind Michael Vanthourenhout.

Jingle Cross in Iowa City
Even a mechanical at the beginning of the second World Cup race, the ”Jingle Cross” in Iowa City, couldn’t put van Aert off his stride. Despite trailing significantly he could catch up to Laurens Sweeck who until that moment had been leading the race, just to attack him right away and win the race by quite a margin. Laurens Sweeck kept up with the top group and by finishing third behind Kevin Pauwels completed the purely Belgian Podium.

First Season Win For David van der Poel
A C2 race serving as a preparation for the World Cup premiere in Iowa City and a C1 race completed the US tour for the European ’cross teams. After Marcel Meisen had won the race before the World Cup, it was David van der Poel of Beobank-Corendon to win the higher-ranked C1 race.

On a course that was faster and drier than that of the 2016 Worlds, where he came in sixth, he was the fastest of a six-strong head group. The older of the van der Poel brothers decided the race in the final lap in one of the few running sections. An intermediate sprint gave him a 12-second advantage over Gianni Vermeersch und Diether Sweeck, both also of team ERA-Circus. Diether’s twin brother Laurens confirmed his good form with a fourth place. Van der Poel’s team mates Vincent Baestaens und Daan Hoeyberghs came in 5th and 8th respectively to complete a very good team result.

…Meanwhile In Europe
At the Radcross race in Illnau/Switzerland Wietse Bosmans rode to third place. The Beobank-Corendon rider had to recover from Lyme disease he had been suffering the previous year. This makes the podium finish in the C2 race even more awesome and gives hope that his form will be stable and might even get better. Only a couple of days later Michael Boros, Bosman’s and van der Poel’s team mate, won the first race of the Toi-Toi Cup in Tabor/Czech Republic aboard his STEVENS Super Prestige.