Matthias Brändle was overtaken in the Worlds time trial but as it was silver medallist Adriano Malori who flew past, it didn't slow him down. It was more frustrating that technical problems perhaps prevented an even better result than 16th place.

"I could go with the pace of Malori. Unfortunately I had a mechanical 8km from the finish. That was devastating," he told radsport-news before adding about what would have been possible with an incident-free run." In the end 13th place was just seven seconds away, and I was only one second behind Stephen Cummings. Just imagine what would have happened if I would have held Malori's pace. "

Brändle had expected Malori to catch him

"Malori is a top rider and if he would catch Matthias, he had to try to stay with him as long as possible. He did that perfectly despite technical problems," said coach Franz Hartl.

Brändle was not satisfied with the result - still one of the best time trial results for the Austrian Cycling Federation ever - but liked his performande on the 53.5 km long trail from Richmond. "I have done around 20 watts more than at the last Worlds in Ponferrada. It was a really strong race," said the 25-year-old. "A year ago I would have been outside the top 30."

Debutant Lukas Pöstlberger was 48th.

"Lukas has never done such a long time trial. He completed his first world time trial championships in the pro ranks in a good way" said national coach Hartl.