Dylan Bibic and Ellesse Andrews took their maiden overall success in the UCI Track Champions League while Harrie Lavreysen and Katie Archibald repeated their triumphs from 2021.
The third edition of the UCI Track Champions League came to a thrilling end on Saturday evening, cementing the series as a groundbreaking and exhilarating event, breathing fresh air in the velodromes towards the end of the year with the ever-growing association of the UCI and Warner Bros. Discovery.
After five rounds - in Palma de Mallorca in Spain, Berlin in Germany, Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines in France and London in Great Britain (host of a double-header, on Friday and Saturday) -, the UCI Track Champions League crowned four stars as the overall winners of the season. Dylan Bibic (CAN) and Ellesse Andrews (NZL) claimed their maiden success while Harrie Lavreysen (NED) and Katie Archibald (GBR) repeated their triumphs from 2021.
Men’s Sprint: Lavreysen shows his raw power
With 13 UCI World Champion titles and two Olympic Games golds, Harrie Lavreysen has already cemented his status as one of the best sprinters ever. But the 2023 UCI Track Champions League gave new insights into his power, with performance data provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS)… and it has been stunning to witness.
Already a winner of the overall standings in the Men’s Sprint League in 2021 before Australian Matthew Richardson edged him last year, the Dutchman showed his determination to claim back his crown and display his outstanding skills nine months ahead of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
Week after week, he set new records, most notably for most points in a season of the UCI Track Champions League: 191, eight more than Richardson’s tally in 2022. His most impressive display of power came in the semi-final of the sprint of Round 4, in London, with a peak power of 2,338 watts to overcome the challenge from Colombian Kevin Quintero and Great Britain’s Joe Truman.
Lavreysen eventually pushed 2,122 watts in the final race of the season to cap off an immense campaign, with seven victories. “It's been a good battle between [Richardson and myself] and we're probably going to have a lot more battles in the future,” he anticipates.
Women’s Sprint: Andrews, the seasoned rookie
Participating in the UCI Track Champions League for the first time, after she took the rainbow stripes in the keirin at the 2023 UCI Cycling World Championships in Glasgow, Scotland, Ellesse Andrews showed that, at 23 years old, she has the power and the craft to rule the Women’s Sprint League.
Alessa-Catriona Pröpster (GER) took the best start, winning in Mallorca, but Andrews then showed her dominance both in the individual sprint and the keirin, eventually claiming 173 points, a new record in the Women’s Sprint League.
She sealed her overall victory with a push at 1,487 watts in the semi-final of the keirin of the Grand Finale. And she kept going with 1,451 watts in the final, hitting her maximum heart rate of the season – 203 bpm – to wrap things up with an emphatic win.
"I couldn't have wished for a better night”, she rejoiced.
Men’s Endurance: youthful Bibic shines
At 20 years, 3 months and 8 days, Dylan Bibic became the youngest winner in the UCI Track Champions League. And he did so in spectacular fashion, setting new records in the Men’s Endurance League with four victories and 131 points.
The Canadian youngster pushed all the way to his limit, with a heart rate of 200 bpm to all but seal the overall victory in the scratch race of the Grand Finale. “I came here to win and it feels good to have achieved that goal,” he said in London.
The Men’s Endurance League proved to be the most open, with Eiya Hashimoto (JPN), Jules Hesters (BEL), Roy Eefting (NED) and William Tidball (GBR) also taking victories over the season.
Women’s Endurance: Archibald delivers like a metronome
The Grand Finale in London was full of thrills and surprises, and Katie Archibald not winning the elimination race was among the most striking of those surprises. Five-time UCI World Champion and two-time Olympic Champion, the British star has won 11 of the 14 elimination races since the inception of the UCI Track Champions League, an outstanding rate of success of 78.6%. But in front of her fans, she had to settle for 3rd, as Ireland’s Lara Gillespie powered to victory with a massive heart rate of 205 bpm.
Still, Archibald sealed her second overall victory in the history of the UCI Track Champions League thanks to her dominant and consistent displays across the season (her worst results were 6th in the scratch races at the 2nd and 4th rounds).
“It's been great to end my year on a high in front of this incredible crowd,” she celebrated.