Women's World Championship Time Trial 2024 History
The Women’s World Championship Time Trial is relatively new compared to the longer history of the road race world title. The first edition was only held in 1994 and despite a load of Dutch dominance in the road, has been a relatively open affair with a large number of countries taking the rainbow stripes against the clock. Karen Kurreck got the ball rolling before Jeannie Longo dominated in the late 90s and early 2000s. The French rider took 4 of the opening 8 editions and is still the rider with the most world TT titles to her name.Â
You tend to see mini eras of dominance throughout, with Leontien van Moorsel winning 2 in a row between Longo’s 3rd and 4th win. Katrin Thürig, Judith Arndt, Annemiek van Vleuten and Ellen van Dijk have also all won titles in consecutive years. Ellen van Dijk also managed to go nearly 10 years between her first win in 2013 and finally reclaiming the title in 2021 and 2022. Anna van der Breggen also has an impressive 4 2nd place finishes, all fitting into a period of 5 years, before finally reaching the top step in 2020. Marlen Reusser and Grace Brown both have a pair of 2nd places in the last 4 years, unfortunately for Reusser, she’s too ill to race her home World Championships Time Trial and this will be the final chance for Grace Brown who is due to retire.
This year’s course is an interesting mix of flat and lumpy. Lasting 29.9km, there is a steady rise for the first third or so of the route before a couple of stepped descents down to the lake and a 15km blast on absolutely flat roads to the finish line in Zurich. Not a pure power course, it should still benefit those riders over the lighter weight riders who may gain some time on the climb.
Previous Winners
2023
Chloe Dygert
2022
Ellen van Dijk
2021
Ellen van Dijk
Women's World Championship Time Trial 2024 Profile
TV Coverage
Sunday 22nd September 2024
Live on Discovery+/Eurosport/Max
10:50-13:35
All times in BST
Twitter: #Zurich2024
Startlist: FirstCycling
Women's World Championship Time Trial 2024 Contenders
Demi Vollering will lead the Dutch squad in both the time trial and road race at the 2024 World Championships in Zurich. Although Vollering hasn’t claimed a Dutch national time trial title, her podium finishes – second in 2022 and third in 2023 – underline her growing strength in the discipline. Last year, she finished sixth in her first elite time trial at the World Championships, and her performances on the WorldTour have only solidified her status. Her victory in the 6.3 km time trial stage of the 2024 Tour de France Femmes highlighted her potential, with the Zurich course offering similar challenges – especially with its climb, descent, and flat stretch.
The three-time TT world champion, Ellen van Dijk, has been selected as the second time trial rider for the Dutch. Though not quite at her absolute peak following her return from maternity leave, Van Dijk remains a strong medal contender. Her recent silver at the European Championships and victories in time trials at the Vuelta Extremadura Feminas and Tour de Normandie show that she is still a major force in the discipline.
Lotte Kopecky has claimed six straight-time trial titles at the Belgian Championships. Though always strong in the discipline, it’s only in recent years that she has truly focused on international events like the European Championships, World Championships, and the Olympic Games. At the World Championships, Kopecky finished ninth in the 2022 time trial in Wollongong but chose not to race it in Glasgow. Instead, she won three world titles in the road race, elimination race, and points race. Despite crashing and finishing sixth in the Olympic time trial, Kopecky has continued to improve. She won gold at the European Championships and is now one of the favourites for the world title in Zurich.
Chloe Dygert is a two-time world champion in the individual time trial, winning in Yorkshire in 2019 and Glasgow in 2023. Now, she aims to secure a third title in Zurich. Dygert is the clear favourite for the challenging course in Zurich. She will be extra motivated after a crash in the Paris Olympic time trial, where she took bronze behind Grace Brown and Anna Henderson. She also crashed in the Olympic road race, but her teammate Kristen Faulkner won gold. Dygert bounced back quickly, taking gold in the Team Pursuit on the track. After the Olympics, Dygert raced in the Tour de France Femmes, finishing second to Demi Vollering in the stage 3 time trial. She also placed second at the GP Plouay, showing strong form before the World Championships.
Grace Brown will lead a strong Australian team at her final World Championships before retiring at the end of the season. She is wrapping up her career after one of her best seasons yet, with wins at Liège-Bastogne-Liège and gold in the individual time trials at both the Australian Championships and the Paris Olympics. Brown’s main goal is to win the world title in the time trial before helping her national teammates in the road race next week. She has a great chance to win the rainbow jersey, having finished 5th in 2020, and runner-up in 2022 and 2023. She also placed fourth in the time trial at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 before winning gold this year in Paris.
The ride Vittoria Guazzini did to win the Italian national TT championship might be her strongest race day on the road this season. She took Olympic gold on the track which is always an achievement but beating peak-form Elisa Longo Borghini, even on a technically, was a big deal. From there, Guazzini took 5th in the European Championships and that feels like a possibility again here. She’s not quite in that top-tier conversation but she’s certainly knocking on that door at her very best.
Austria’s Christina Schweinberger took the bronze medal at the European Championships time trial, maybe a slight surprise seeing how far back she’d been at the Tour de France Femmes short blast of a TT and 10th at the Olympics. It’s known that’s in her wheelhouse thanks to older results but she certainly hooked up everything right on that day. She was 3rd in the Worlds TT last year that finished on the uphill to the castle in Stirling. That feels tough to tip to repeat but there’s a nice outside chance still.
British hopes will be fully behind Anna Henderson who was mightily impressive taking the silver medal in the TT on the wet slippery streets of Paris. She’s never really thought of in the same boat as the likes of Vollering and Van Dijk but her results do start to put her in that conversation, especially if she can back up that silver again here. She was 10th in the short blast Tour de France Femmes time trial, not a bad result and better than some others on this list. Team GB forewent the European Championships unfortunately, so we haven’t got a more recent data point for her form. She could end up in the medals if things go her way.
Amber Neben has done so many editions of the World Championship Time Trial that it’s almost tough to keep count. The American has shown her longevity in the event by still being a top-10 threat. In her 16 attempts to take the world title, she’s won twice and finished in the top-10 in every edition except for 2 of them. It’s not like she’s slowing down with age either, those years she finished outside of the top-10 were her very first race in 2022 and in 2017 as well. The PanAmerican champion is a banker for adding another strong finish.
Brodie Chapman has been strong against the clock all season with the Aussie not winning a time trial but coming awfully close in 2024. She was 2nd in the Aussie Nat Champs behind Grace Brown, then 2nd in the Vuelta Extremadura Feminas behind Ellen van Dijk and 2nd at the Thüringen Ladies Tour TT stage behind Mischa Bredewold. She was also 3rd on the opening day of the Giro d’Italia Women with only Grace Brown (again) and Elisa Longo Borghini finishing ahead of her. The top-10 feels like a certainty, medals are maybe just out of the question but we could see Brodie in the top-5 this year.
French fans will find it hard to pick apart Juliette Labous and Cédrine Kerbaol. The former was 4th, achingly close to a home Olympics medal in Paris in probably her best time trial result of the year. She was also 4th in the Tour de Suisse time trial but that was more of a hill climb than the sort of parcours we have here in Zurich this year. Cédrine Kerbaol has a TT win to her name in 2024, winning the Chrono “Roland Bouge!” recently as a warm-up for this event. The field strength wasn’t too high there but she was still comfortably the fastest. She was 2nd in French Nats behind Audrey Cordon-Ragot (who is only racing the Mixed Relay here) but strong efforts saw her finish 4th in Rotterdam during the Tour de France Femmes and 9th on the opener stage of the Giro.
Top 3 Prediction
- Chloe Dygert
- Grace Brown
- Lotte Kopecky
