Ondřej Cink stunned the cross-country Olympic (XCO) world by taking his first UCI World Cup victory at 34 years young for CUBE Factory Racing while Puck Pieterse (Alpecin - Deceuninck) underlined her supremacy by claiming her second women’s Elite win of the weekend.
In sharp contrast to the dry conditions that produced two gripping downhill races yesterday, rain turned The Epic Bikepark into a mudbowl and Pieterse and Cink were the proverbial pigs who took advantage.
Those treacherous conditions meant the slipstream benefit of staying in the pack was outweighed by a solo rider’s advantage of being able to choose their line while the packed slate with Gravity riders also in attendance in Saalfelden Leogang – Salzburgerland meant the cross-country field enjoyed a rare day off between the cross-country short track (XCC) and XCO races.
That helped Pieterse do the double for the first time in her career having attacked very early on, never to be seen again by the chasing pack and Cink seemingly ghosted away also with six laps to go but never enjoyed the same margin, instead triumphing in a nail-biting pursuit.
The U23 races saw Finn Treudler make it two wins today for CUBE Factory Racing while Fiona Schibler dominated the women’s field.
PIETERSE CAPS PERFECT SAALFELDEN LEOGANG WEEKEND
Pieterse missed the opening Araxá, Minas Gerais (Brazil) double-header but has appeared keen to make up for lost time ever since, as only a puncture in last week’s XCO race preventing her from winning all four races since her return to the series.
After Samara Maxwell had a poor start for Decathlon Ford Racing Team and slipped back towards 20th wheel immediately, Pieterse dropped the hammer as only Loana Lecomte (BMC Factory Racing) could follow the initial acceleration.
But even the French National Champion couldn’t follow those rainbow bands as she was forced to watch her rival’s back wheel escape up the road - something that would become a theme of Lecomte’s afternoon.
Pieterse’s attack strung out the field as Maxwell produced a carbon copy kick on the lap two climb, the Kiwi distancing her rivals for the overall World Cup even if the gap to the leaders continued to grow.
The torrid weather continued to hamper the pack as Jenny Rissveds (Canyon CLLCTV XCO) slid out on the cyclo-cross section at the end of the circuit - Evie Richards (Trek Factory Racing - Pirelli) would suffer the same fate on the final lap - and Candice Lill opted to dismount and toboggan down the steep rooty section that had earlier caught out Jennifer Jackson (Orbea FOX Factory Team).
At the front, Lecomte watched a third rider disappear up the trail on as many laps when Ramona Forchini (BIXS Performance Race Team) jumped clear though she couldn’t make major inroads to Maxwell even after the red jersey slid into an airbag after losing control on a tricky descent.
Maxwell was holding her own and even gaining time downhill against Pieterse but she just couldn’t match the Dutchwoman on the climbs, even as she showed signs of slowing down on lap six.
At times on the final circuit the entire field appeared to be running in slow motion while Lecomte continued to slide, overtaken by Tamara Wiedmann (Mondraker Factory Racing XC) and mud specialist Jolanda Neff (Cannondale Factory Racing Team).
And that pair would provide the best action at the finish line as Neff won an all-out sprint to claim fourth behind a runaway podium. Pieterse enjoyed a victory margin of 50 seconds with Forchini over half a minute further back en route to claiming her maiden podium, while in seventh place privateer Isla Short finished in the top 10 of a UCI World Cup round for the first time.
“It’s been a goal of mine to have the perfect weekend and until now it didn’t work out, but I’m super happy today in this track. I maybe was a bit too eager to get to the front directly, I’m not good at waiting so I decided to go for it, said Pieterse.
“Nobody had a perfect race without unclipping or a small tumble or anything so me too, I had some troubles on the upper part of the track but I knew others would make mistakes as well as well so as long as it only happened once it’s not a big problem.
“It’s just nice to take my own lines, I couldn’t see what the others were doing but sometimes that’s also good you don’t know if they’re super fast in the descents or catching up on the climb but the only time I really looked back was on the steep climb.”
Though outclassed in Saalfelden Leogang - Salzburgerland, there were still plenty of reasons to be cheerful for Maxwell who overcame that crash and a dropped chain to finish second - saying “no words” as she crossed the line - and further inflate her overall lead to 290 points as Nicole Koller (Ghost Factory Racing) could only manage eighth.
TIMELESS CINK HOLDS OFF HIGH-CALIBRE PURSUIT FOR HISTORY
The men’s elites didn’t see the same race-breaking moves as the women’s but produced an even more gripping final few laps as Ondrej Cink looked set to be reeled in before finding a second wind to take a historic victory.
Martin Vidaurre Kossman led initially for Specialized Factory Racing but the day turned into a nightmare for team that had won every single 2025 Men Elite UCI Cross-country World Cup race until Sunday morning.
Vidaurre couldn’t hold the pace and would trail home in 24th while Victor Koretzky stepped off his bike at the end of lap two having plummeted through the order suffering from illness and the effects of a training crash.
Christopher Blevins (Specialized Factory Racing) was also off-colour though without the same mitigating circumstances and did well to limit the damage to a 17th-place finish.
Vidaurre was part of a leading quartet that featured Julian Schelb (KMC Ridley MTB Racing Team), Mathias Flückiger (Thömus Maxon) and Cink though only the latter pair could stay ahead as carnage reigned at the beginning of the race.
Gioele Bertolini and Loan Cheneval were lucky to escape injury when the Italian fell on the same section as Maxwell (and later Giant Factory Off-Road Team - XC’s Alan Hatherly) and then got straight back up into the path of the Frenchman, with Norwegian National Champion Knut Rhøme (Origine Racing Division) and Vito Albin (Thömus Maxon) also delayed.
But Albin showed his powers of recovery when he, Hatherly and surprise package privateer Fabio Püntener bridged across to Vidaurre, then passed the Chilean to join Flückiger as Cink’s main pursuers.
Cink never held an advantage of more than 24 seconds, and the gap fell to as low as 11 seconds at one stage Czech’s energy seemed to be fading. But he dug deep to summon more horsepower with the carrot of a maiden victory at this level in sight, crossing the finish line 18 seconds of Flückiger, who had decisively dropped Püntener on the final climb.
Cink is the second-oldest male XCO rider to take his maiden UCI World Cup victory behind Ned Overend in 1994 and the first Czech rider to win in the category for 10 years - it’s just the 11th Elite cross-country or downhill victory for Czechia in UCI World Cup history and Cink was unable to explain the miracle afterwards:
“I’m super happy, I was waiting for a long time for this, I was second many times and I really like this place, I was U23 world champion here in Saalfeden [in 2012]. I was thinking once that my career is already over because I’m one of the oldest here so I don’t have words for that.
“This course suits me very well but the conditions not really, I don’t like the muddy conditions, slippery but I don’t know what happened today, I just did it. With two laps I started to feel really bad but when I saw I opened the gap a little bit I got some power again and I pushed the limit in the last climb.”
Meanwhile Specialized still lead the overall standings with a 1-2-3 despite their Sunday no-show with Blevins expanding his lead over Koretzky to 341 points.
TREUDLER AND SCHIBLER STAMP AUTHORITY ON U23s
Finn Treudler kicked clear on lap 2 and disappeared like Pieterse to win the men’s U23 race by almost the same margin - 47 seconds - to re-establish himself as the undisputed force in the category.
Treudler was bested in Nové Město Na Moravě (Czechia) by Paul Schehl (Lexware Mountainbike Team) but hit back in style after his cat-and-mouse XCC victory on Friday in Saalfelden Leogang - Salzburgerland, a perfect weekend that clearly meant a lot to the Swiss rider.
"It’s amazing to finally pull the double with short track and XCO, I’m super happy especially with these tough conditions,” Treudler said. “The track changed lap-by-lap because it got drier so it was a really difficult race today but I’m super happy with my win.”
Only Elina Benoit could live with Fiona Schibler’s punishing pace in the opening laps of the women’s U23, and it didn’t take long for the leader to distance her compatriot either.
On a day of solo triumphs, Schibler was the most dominant victor of them all as only Monique Halter could get within two minutes of the Swiss rider, who took her first WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series win in fine style.
Overall leader Ella MacPhee had her worst XCO race of the season in seventh, but Isabella Holmgren’s absence means she retains an almost 100-point advantage at the top of the standings, while Schibler moves into sixth and said afterwards:
“It was amazing, I had a good start, I was in the front with Elina then in the third lap I went and was alone in front. We changed wheels before the race and I just took some lines that were safe”, said Schibler.
MacPhee, Blevins, Koretzky and the rest of those leaving Saaldelden Leogang – Salzburgerland disappointed don’t have to wait long for a chance to put things right though as the WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series returns in just two weeks. Cross-country and downhill riders will once again take centre stage in Val di Sole - Trentino, Italy, for the halfway point of the XCO and XCC UCI World Cups.
