Frustration instead of World Cup bronze
Olympic champion clears German professional cyclist and causes trouble
8/11/2023 8:54 am
Luca Schwarzbauer is on course for a medal at the World Cycling Championships in Glasgow before Olympic champion Thomas Pidcock comes shot in the last corner and rams the German out of the medal ranks. The superstar’s action causes trouble.
Mountain biker Luca Schwarzbauer unfortunately missed out on a medal in the short track competition at the World Championships in Glasgow. The German champion fell in the last corner while in third place during a hard overtaking maneuver by British Olympic champion Thomas Pidcock, got back up and crossed the finish line in ninth place. The New Zealander Sam Gaze successfully defended the title. After eleven laps of 900 meters each, Gaze was ahead of Frenchman Victor Koretzky. Bronze went to Pidcock, whose borderline maneuver including a slight contact against the black pawn had no consequences.
But Schwarzbauer was very angry: “Tom kicked me out, he drove into me completely in the curve. I’m super disappointed because a bronze medal would have been pretty safe. He’s Tom Pidcock, he’s a superstar, but that gives him don’t have the right to do something like that,” complained the German after the race. He confronted Pidcock with his anger at the finish. “I said that I thought it was a very bad move. At first he said: ‘It’s part of the race’, but then he realized that I had fallen. But he’s so aggressive, you can really see that he’s the most aggressive rider, no one else rides like that. I don’t think any pure mountain biker would do that.”
Pidcock drives as a professional for the top team Ineos Grenadiers, at the Tour de France he won a stage in 2022. The star of the scene later reacted calmly to Schwarzbauer’s comments: “If you no longer drive into a gap, then you’re no longer a racing driver. Of course I didn’t want him to fall, and I’m sorry.”
Schwarzbauer had won two World Cups in this young discipline this season and was one of the favourites. Julian Schelb was the second best German in twelfth place, David List was 17th. Maximilian Brandl, who had won bronze at the World Cup premiere in 2021, was only 29th. Long-time top road driver Peter Sagan (Slovakia) had to settle for 37th place. As in 2022, Pauline Ferrand-Prevot from France won the women’s race, silver went to Puck Pieterse from the Netherlands ahead of Evie Richards (Great Britain). As the best German, Lia Schrievers came in a good twelfth place, Ronja Eibl and Leonie Daubermann took 15th and 16th place.