Petr Vakoč (Canyon Isadore) and Tessa Neefjes (Liv Racing) on Saturday gained the 2025 version of The Gralloch, taking out tight-run sprints within the coronary heart of the Gatehouse of Fleet to say the Scottish spherical of the UCI Gravel World Series.
Within the elite males’s race it was 4 riders racing towards the end line in Garries Park collectively, with Vakoč claiming the race in three hours, eight minutes and 15 seconds by beating defending champion and 114 Gravel Race winner Matthew Holmes (OGT Issue Racing) with a throw to the road. Paris to Ancaster winner Benjamin Perry got here third as Ben Thomas (Ribble Outliers) simply missed the rostrum as he tailed over the road in the back of the four-way dash.
Vakoč had truly gone out with Thomas earlier within the race, however suffered a puncture about two hours in, with the time taken to restore it leaving him with a chase to work his method again to the entrance of the race. He managed to shut the hole of a few minute to Thomas however it took a toll.
“After that I attempted to go solo however I used to be a bit spent so I didn’t handle after which the cooperation wasn’t working properly,” Vakoč mentioned in an interview with the race commentator on the YouTube live coverage.
The lead duo had been then joined by Holmes and Perry because the race was heading into the ultimate phases.
“I had my plan for the dash and it labored out completely, so I’m glad however it was actually shut and I actually needed to dig deep for this one,” mentioned Vakoč.
Within the distinct ladies’s elite race, beginning round two hours later than the boys’s occasion to scale back the impression of the blending throughout the fields, it was a three-way dash to determine the victor. Neefjes gained one other tight battle in a time of three hours, forty 4 minutes and 54 seconds. It was simply Neefjes second UCI Gravel World Collection race this season after she broke her collarbone, with the rider who needed to skip The Traka having returned to the sequence on the Marly Gravel Race final weekend.
There have been simply centimetres between her and second-placed British bicycle owner Ffion Gilbert whereas Soiled Reiver winner Sophie Wright was simply behind, making it to the UCI Gravel World Collection podium this time after simply lacking out when she took fourth at Turnhout Gravel in March.
The riders, nevertheless, had truly thought they had been sprinting for second, so it was a pleasing shock for a delighted Neefjes when she discovered that the hard-fought dash had truly been for the highest spot.
“I like successful however I used to be nonetheless a bit blissful,” mentioned the rider of initially pondering that she had truly come second by claiming the dash battle. “I had a chilly this week so I wasn’t feeling that match and I used to be getting back from collarbone surgical procedure.”
The 111km race with 1,761m of elevation acquire and greater than 80% gravel takes riders into the hills of the Galloway and dense woodlands of the Southern Ayrshire UNESCO Biosphere. Final yr Holmes and Geerike Schreurs gained the elite classes however the SD Worx-Protime rider was unable to line as much as defend her title, as an alternative nonetheless recovering from a foul crash at The Traka.
The Gralloch was the second spherical of the UCI Gravel World Collection this weekend, with racing additionally at SEVEN in Western Australia’s Nannup, gained by Tiffany Cromwell (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto) and Mark O’Brien (Trappist).
