Kasper Asgreen (Soudal-QuickStep) returned to racing Saturday for the first time since crashing out of Paris Roubaix in April and lined at the Gravel Challenge Blaavands Huk in Denmark for his first UCI Gravel World Series event.
Fellow Dane Tobias Mørch Kongstad (PAS Normal Studios), a former road pro who was second in his first gravel race last weekend at The Traka 360, won the men's 160km division. Frederik Muff (Coloquick Cycling) came second while Uno-X ProTeam’s Jacob Hindsgaul came third. Asgreen finished 27th in the 19-34 men's category and just outside the top 30 in the overall of the men's category.
Tessa Neefjes (Liv Racing Collective) was dominant in the women’s category, the sectors on the beach of the Danish east coast playing to her strengths as the European Beach Racing Champion. Neefjes, who was third last week at Limburg and won the French and Belgian rounds of the series last year, finished more than 15 minutes ahead of Danish mountain biker Klara Sofie Skovgaard Hansen while 2022 Dutch road racer Noä Jansen took third.
As the attention of the world’s cycling media was overwhelming focussed on Asgreen's QuickStep teammate Remco Evenepoel as he blasted to victory at the Giro d’Italia's opening time trial, the Dane became another member of the WorldTour peloton taking on a gravel diversion this season.
The 2021 Tour of Flanders winner started out strongly in the wet and muddy event in his homeland, having leapt into a break of two. The trio pushed out the front at the end of the first lap of three. However by the second lap he was down in 47th place, having experienced a mechanical issue.
"I didn’t know you could knock off a tubeless valve whilst riding. But I found out during the race @blaavandgravel yesterday. Obviously that cost me any hopes of winning the thing eheh," Asgreen wrote on social media. "But what a fun event, loved riding on that epic course, crazy danish conditions and tonnes of people."
Asgreen began his foray into off-road adventures at Big Sugar Gravel in the US last year. Along with teammate Mattia Cattaneo, the duo finished sixth and seventh in the Little Sugar event. On Saturday, Asgreen fought back to finish inside the top 30 by the end of the race, finishing nearly 19 minutes behind race winner.
Gravel Challenge Blaavands Huk is the fourth round of the UCI Gravel World Series. Next in the series is the Australian round in Nannup, Western Australia, with the 125km SEVEN race taking place on May 13. The event will host the UCI Gravel World Championships in 2026, with Italy, Belgium and hosting the next three editions.
The Gravel World Series events act as qualifiers for the UCI Gravel World Championships, with riders also accumulating points towards their grid positions at the races. A large contingent of riders from other cycling disciplines joined the gravel racing fray at last year’s World Championships and that trend is continuing through to the Gravel World Series rounds and other gravel events.
