The word epic is overused but it nicely describes the amazing battle between Zdenek Stybar and Sven Nys for the 2014 Cyclocross Worlds title. Enjoy this gallery from the men's race courtesy of Tom Prenen.
Spectators had really filled in for this popular event and that made it much harder for Tom to get to the locations he desired, but we will work closely with him so he'll have proper UCI media access next year and won't have to shoot from the spectator row.
Standing among the crowd is not always a bad thing, and Daniel Grosjean shows why - fries with waffles.
Zdenek Stybar and Sven Nys are closely followed by Francis Mourey who is a great starter.
Rob Peeters and Radomir Simunek have played this game for a while.
Klaas Vantornout and Wiets Bosmans round this corner in pursuit of the leaders.
The next lap Stybar and Nys had opened up a nice advantage and only Lars van der Haar managed to stay close.
When it was over 6 places of the top ten spots were filled by Belgians and no one was surprised.
There was plenty of mud left for Ian Field and Jonathan Page.
Stybar and Nys were attached to each other like glue and the fight for the top spot was fantastic.
KEvin Pauwels and Francis Mourey battled hard but could not get closer to the leaders.
The American team did not have the day they expected and sandwiched between Jonathan Page and Jeremy Powers is Dutch rider Eddy van Ijzendoorn.
It appears that Thijs Al is trying to judge the distance to the rider ahead.
German Marcel Meisen leads another group a bit further back.
Luxembourger Christian Helmig ended up a lap down.
Wietse Bosmans with number 9 grabbed 10th place, and Niels Albert just ahead of him here dropped back to 20th place - over 3 minutes behind the champion Zdenek Stybar.
American Ryan Trebon was injured early on with a deep gash in his calf but soldiered on.
Kiwi Pro Alexander Revell was all alone here and ended up 2 laps down.
Sven Nys managed a gap here, but could not hold on to that lead.
For Niels Albert this day was not what he had wanted.
Jeremy Powers manages a smile after the race.
All images © Tom Prenen
