The 19 -year -old Frenchwoman won over the online race on Thursday in Kigali (Rwanda).
:quality(50)/2023/06/21/6492bae49ac64_maylicerond.png)
Published
Updated
Reading time: 2min
:quality(50)/2025/09/25/043-135251392-68d55a201d04c983413542.jpg)
First title for the Blues at road cycling Worlds. The Frenchwoman Célia Gery brought her first gold medal to the French delegation by winning the hopes race of the world championships in Rwanda, Thursday, September 25.
In legs throughout the 119.3 -kilometer circuit around the capital Kigali, the native of Talencieux (Ardèche) won the sprint in front of the Slovak Viktoria Chladonova (+2 ''). The Spanish Paula Blasi completes the podium.
Célia Gery will be able to thank her teammate Marion Bunnel, who sacrificed herself in the final to bring her to the finish line. While the Bleues were the only ones in numerical superiority in the head group, Bunnel broke away from the group of favorites, at the end of the effort, in the ascent of the Kimihurura coast (1.3 kilometer at 6.3%). His teammate at Visma-Lease A Bike, the Slovak Viktoria Chladonova (already a medalist on the U23 time trial), followed her with Célia Gery in her wheel. Putting on orbit, Gery then set Chladonova to sprint with ease. Marion Bunnel finished fifth after fighting to try to offer a second medal to the tricolor delegation.
“We were three strong girls in the team, it was really a teamwork with Julie at first, then with Marion who told me that she felt a little worse in the cobblestones, so we bet everything on me. She made an extraordinary end in the cobblestones, in the last kilometers, it's really a team job”reacted the new champion after the race.
At just 19, Célia Gery, who has just shone with three stages of stages on the tour of the future, succeeds the Dutch Puck Pieterse and the Hungarian Blanka Vas. She becomes the first French world champion hopes on the online race, for her first year in the category.
This is the third medal for the Blues in these 2025 world championships, After the third place of Maxime Decomble on the male time trial among the juniors, and the silver of the mixed team relay.
