Ruska Saarela (FIN) and Jan Hasek (CZE) won the first gold medals at the 2024 CX80 World MTBO Championships, which began in Bulgaria on Tuesday.
The championships kicked off with the sprint: 9,3/10,8 kilometers for women and men respectively in the old city of Pliska, featuring a flat terrain with a dense network of small roads and paths.
Jan Hasek had an impressive race without notable time losses and won his first individual WMTBOC gold beating Lithuania’s Jonas Maiselis by 12 seconds, while Vojtech Ludvik (CZE) came in third, 36 seconds slower than Hasek.
Ludvik had similar split times to compatriot Hasek in the beginning, but lost time to control 7 and never came close to the gold again. Maiselis was never far behind Hasek and today’s silver was his first individual World Championships medal.
The women’s race was much closer with four athletes within just 12 seconds.
Ruska Saarela was fastest in the streets of Pliska and won her first WMTBOC gold with 9 seconds to Martina Tichovska (CZE).
The current World Cup standings number 1 and 2, Nikoline Splittorff (DEN) and Gabriele Andrasiuniene (LTU) tied for the bronze, three seconds further behind.
It was also the juniors’ first race at JWMTBOC and here Eemil Koskinen (FIN) won M20 ahead of Hannes Hnilica (AUT) and Ole Gunnar Kleppa Madslien (NOR).
W20 was won by Iris Aurora Pecorari (ITA) ahead of Sofie Stranska (CZE) and Kaisla Hakkinen (FIN).
Find all results and GPS-tracking at IOF LIVE.
The athletes will have another medal race tomorrow, when the Mass Start is on for both seniors and juniors.
Start times – EEST (UTC +3):
10:00 Women
10:10 W20
10:30 Men
10:40 M20
Photo: Kiril Panayotov / WMTBOC 2024