UCI Cyclo-cross World Cup – Besançon

The Besançon round of the UCI Cyclo-cross World Cup is a cyclocross race in the French city of Besançon, first held at La Malcombe in 2021. It has had no fixed place in the season: its first three editions were raced on November 28, 2021, January 29, 2023 and December 29, 2024. The course, largely grass with man-made stairs when the World Cup first came, gave the men heavy mud in 2021, dry and fast ground in 2023 and a layer of ice over mud in 2024.

What is the World Cup course in Besançon like?

The World Cup rounds of 2021 and 2023 were raced at La Malcombe in Besançon, in 2023 at the Michel Vautrot sports complex. The lap of 2021 was largely grass, with a flyover, man-made stairs and a section through woods. A series of rollers and two big stretches of pavement broke up the grass, and a few parts of the lap were off-camber. In 2023 the riders dismounted for a stairs section and crossed a pump track and barriers, and the women’s race went up steep mud ascents.

The men’s races of the first three editions were run on three different surfaces: heavy mud in 2021, dry and fast ground in 2023, and a layer of ice over mud in 2024.

The first World Cup round in Besançon, November 2021

The Amicale Cycliste Bisontine had already organized two championships and five French Cup rounds when the World Cup stopped in Besançon for the first time, on November 28, 2021. The preview videos had shown a course of dry grass. The men raced in heavy mud. Eli Iserbyt, the World Cup leader, and Toon Aerts went back and forth until Iserbyt won by 10 seconds, and Pim Ronhaar, in third, finished 1 minute 44 seconds behind the winner.

In the women’s race the Clauzel sisters took the holeshot, the lead into the first corner, before their home crowd. Lucinda Brand then rode away from everyone, and the contest was for second place, between Maghalie Rochette, Denise Betsema, Fem van Empel and Puck Pieterse. Rochette, of Canada, used her running to drop the other three and finished 26 seconds behind Brand.

January 2023, the last round before the world championships

The World Cup came back on January 29, 2023, for the final round of the 2022 to 2023 series, a week before the world championships in Hoogerheide. Minutes into the women’s race Puck Pieterse, the Dutch champion, stalled on one of the circuit’s steep mud ascents with a dropped chain. She lost more than 20 seconds, and in less than a lap she was at the front again. On the third lap she dropped the field at the barriers, and she won by 37 seconds from Annemarie Worst.

The men raced in sunshine at 4 degrees Celsius, in dry and fast conditions. Clément Venturini, the French champion, led for most of the second lap, which left a front group of 12. Mathieu van der Poel pushed on hard on an uphill stretch in the fourth lap and rode alone to the finish, 49 seconds ahead of Laurens Sweeck. “On a fast course like this, this is the best thing you can do. If a big group is behind you, they will look at each other a few times,” Van der Poel said. Venturini finished fourth.

December 2024, when ice lay over the mud

On December 29, 2024, the cold had left a thin crust of ice on the slick mud, and a course that is usually fast rode heavy. Fem van Empel, the world champion, had a gap on all her chasers after one lap of the five-lap women’s race and kept it to the finish, where she was 37 seconds ahead of Lucinda Brand. On the finish straight riders blew on their hands to warm their fingers. Marianne Vos, back in cyclocross after almost two years away, started on the fifth row, was 15th after one lap and finished fifth, two seconds behind Zoe Backstedt.

Mathieu van der Poel started the men’s race on the second row. He worked through the traffic to Toon Aerts, took a faster line down a small drop to get in front, and then rode the fastest lap of the race, 9:13, on the second lap. After that Van der Poel picked his way over ruts of mud and ice to his second win in Besançon. Aerts finished second, 20 seconds back, the place he had also taken in 2021.