Emma Hinze looked anxiously at the scoreboard, then jubilantly raised her arm. The sprint queen impressively continued her hunt for gold at the cycling world championships and raced to the world title in the 500-meter time trial on Friday. One day after gold in the team sprint, Hinze set the fastest time of 32.820 seconds on the wooden oval in the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome. Teammate Lea Sophie Friedrich (33.134) secured bronze behind Australian Kristina Clonan. There was also a medal for the former track cyclist Robert Förstemann, who took third place in the 1000 meter time trial with Thomas Ulbricht in the Para competitions.
“I’m very proud. I’ve now got the rainbow jersey in every discipline, which is very cool. That’s the title I was missing. If it’s the same next year, that would be great. But you can definitely take a lot with you,” said Hinze, for whom it was already the eighth world title of her career. She is on par with Friedrich and is approaching the World Cup record set by Kristina Vogel (11), who has been paraplegic since her training accident in 2018. Friedrich was “more than happy to be back on the podium” and was also happy about the gold from teammate and friend Hinze: “Emma is in a great mood. I also had a little grin when she won.
Two more gold chances at WM
One year before the Olympics, Hinze is in impressive form. After a weak start, she still clinched victory ahead of Clonan with a strong second lap. Already in the team sprint, the native of Hildesheim made the difference in second place. And her hunt for the title in Glasgow is far from over: in the keirin and in the sprint, two more (gold) chances await.
Let’s hope that the World Cup frenzy isn’t a bad omen for the Paris Olympics. As a three-time world champion from Berlin, she traveled to Tokyo in 2021 and ultimately had to settle for silver in the team sprint. “When I won in Berlin, I didn’t find it a burden. But I’ve already noticed how much everyone at the Olympics is looking at me and my performance. And how it felt like the opponents only raced against me,” Hinze recalls. “It was difficult to experience that on site because I had never experienced it before and didn’t know how to deal with it.”
She seems to have matured now. She also settled a bill from the 2022 World Cup. With her best time in qualifying, she clearly put Marie-Divine Kouamé in her place. Last year, the young Frenchwoman inflicted a painful defeat on her in the 500-meter time trial. Pauline Grabosch (33.296) rounded off the strong German result in fifth place.
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For the once so glorious German foursome, however, the long wait for a World Cup medal continues even after 21 years. Theo Reinhardt, Tobias Buck-Gramcko, Joachim Eilers and Felix Groß finished seventh in the 4000m team pursuit in 3:51.282 minutes. In 2002, the German foursome with silver in Copenhagen had won the last medal before the downward trend began. Until then, the team pursuit was a great success story in German cycling. In the past, German teams have won five Olympic games and 16 world championship titles.
The team sprinters also missed the podium. Luca Spiegel, Nik Schröter and Maximilian Dörnbach lost to the Australians (42.130) on Friday’s first lap in 42.920 seconds and finished fifth overall.
Even in the women’s foursome, which won gold in Tokyo in 2021, there will probably be nothing with a medal. Franziska Brausse, Lisa Klein, Mieke Kröger and Laura üßmilch only set the sixth best time of 4:15.035 minutes in qualifying. This means that in the next round on Saturday, entry into the small final is at most possible.