Racing Against Junior Men: Kopecky Takes an Unconventional Approach to Worlds

Twice a winner of the UCI world championship road race, Lotte Kopecky is returning to an unconventional approach she adopted in 2023, the year she first took the rainbow jersey.

In June of that year she lined out in the Wetteren ten Ede race, days before taking road and TT victory at the Belgian national championships. She then did four other national-registered races in the buildup to the Tour de France Femmes, where she won a stage and finished second overall.

So what was unconventional about that?

Those five events comprised a peloton made up of junior men.

It clearly worked in honing her form and so she has recreated that approach once again, hoping to turn around an underwhelming season and to be in top shape for the worlds.

Kopecky was a DNS on stage 3 of the Tour of Britain Women due to illness. On Sunday she competed in the Molenbeek-Wersbeek race, finishing 36th against the junior men, 1:16 back.

The reason? To get her top condition and to chase another rainbow jersey.

“I mainly want to get a feel for the rhythm,” Kopecky previously explained to Sporza in 2023. “Those guys give me stimuli that I can really use later in the season.”

Cycling Flanders training coordinator Jan Vancompernolle explained that this is still the approach.

“Lotte is doing this because of the intensity of a junior race,” he said, according to Nieuwsblad. “Juniors are energetic riders. The speed at which they ride is much higher than in a women’s race.

“The way those juniors accelerate after a corner, you don’t see that in women’s races. At the moment, in Belgium, women can only ride criteriums and those are raced much more passively. On Sunday, Lotte was looking for intensity and rhythm.”

‘Growing back to her level’

Kopecky has had a quiet season thus far, with just three wins to her credit. This is a fraction of what she racked up two years ago but this season, like last season, has been more modest than earlier in her career.

However national team coach Ludwig Willem told Sporza that things are looking up.

“She is growing back to her level of 2 to 3 years ago,” he said.

“Of course, the international level also rises every year, but I’m convinced that Lotte has a shot at the podium. I also feel that her focus is really on the world championships now.

“She’s ready to go for a strong performance.”

The elite women’s time trial championships is on September 20, with the road race following six days later.

Vancompernolle suggests that she might fit in another junior men’s race before the worlds.

“The effect of such a competition cannot possibly be simulated by training,” he said. “Will we see her do it again this weekend? She has one more weekend before she travels to Canada.

“Lotte is someone who listens very well to her feeling. So it could well be that she does it again, but she certainly has not made that decision yet.”