British cyclo-cross champion Cameron Mason was left bitterly disappointed at the UEC Cyclo-cross European Championships on Sunday, finishing sixth.
The 26-year-old set the fastest lap as he chased the lead of the race, but was unable to come back from a slow start in Zeddam, the Netherlands.
The race was won by Belgium’s Thibau Nys for a second European title as his country swept the podium, through Joran Wyseure and Niels Vandeputte. Nys powered away from the former on the final lap, while the latter won the sprint from a small chasing group. Mason was at the back of this, having pulled his way back on. However, it was not enough to satisfy him.
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“I didn’t stop believing, until one lap to go, when I threw it all away,” he posted on Instagram. “Even after the shocking position I put myself in on the first part of the race, I wasn’t raised to be a quitter.”
On the first lap, Mason, who finished second at the Euros in 2024, was 27th, showing how much work he had to do to get back to the front. By the sixth lap, the Scot was in 10th, but still 21 seconds behind the leaders; a 6:19 lap on the seventh time round the tough course was not enough to bring the race back together, despite it being the fastest lap of the whole race.
At the back of the group for the sprint for bronze, Mason did not feature once Vandeputte had opened up, which meant sixth.
“Today, like with the rest of life, I realised no one is going to do it for you,” he wrote. “There will be many wonderful people who will help, guide and believe in you. But when it really matters, it’s all on you.
“That’s why today hurts so much. To show just how much I wanted it, but to fall short of a result on paper.
“But what a privilege it is to put my heart and soul into doing hard things. I will be back.”
The disappointment came two days after Mason was involved in a spat with Michael Vanthourenhout at the Superprestige Middelkerke, which the Belgian later apologised over.
