Tactics will not be an issue at the barbecue of national gravel coach Ten Dam: "Let them play in the woods"

About thirty people having a barbecue in the backyard on a gray autumn evening. You usually don't think of cyclists preparing for a race, but with the World Gravel Championship approaching, you do. Team Netherlands held a barbecue Thursday night, but there needed to be a tactical discussion.

With the smoke of the barbecue in the background, national coach Laurens ten Dam spoke to NOS. As a former road pro, the gravel coach knows all about the sacrifices a rider has to make to reach the top of road cycling and is all too happy with his place in gravel racing. "I don't want to say it's a hobby sport, but here you can still sit in a garden with thirty people and laugh on Thursdays while you have to race on a Saturday," he laughs. A beer here, a rib there: things are different from what one would expect right before a World Championship.

When tactics are commonly discussed, that topic does not appear in conversations. "I happened to have Puck (Pieterse, ed.) on the app yesterday, and she says: "Are there actually any tactics, or should we just not hinder each other?" I said: it's mostly about the latter." And so, for top favorite Pieterse, it's just a case of pushing hard and seeing where it all ends. "Let them play nice in the woods like we used to start as little boys and girls."

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Brand: "Kind of annoying for those whose main focus is gravel"

Lucinda Brand will be on the start sheet alongside Pieterse. The number eight of this year's Tour de France Femmes also attended the socials. "Totally 0.0 it wasn't, but a beer will do," she says. Many gravel specialists are frustrated because suddenly accomplished pros compete in the World Championships while they did not compete in a gravel race. Yet they are automatically favorites. "It might be annoying for those who gravel all year and for whom that whole year is just the main event that suddenly we are not so important. But hopefully, it also just takes them to a higher level and eventually develops into a specialized discipline."

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