Schreiber Escapes, Vanthourenhout Holds On, Van Empel Returns: A Wet Berencross in Meulebeke

Marie Schreiber won alone by 15 seconds. Michael Vanthourenhout won by one second, with three riders on the same time behind him. Those are the Meulebeke cyclocross 2026 results, and the gap between those two margins tells you what the rain did to the Berencross on Saturday 17 October. A downpour before the elite races turned the circuit heavy and slippery. In the women’s race it broke the favourites one by one: Lucinda Brand crashed, Denise Betsema got stuck on a bank, and Schreiber of Luxembourg rode clear of Aniek van Alphen on the last lap. In the men’s race it could not separate anyone. Six riders started the final lap together and four finished inside one second.

There was a third story, and for many people in Meulebeke it was the first one. Fem van Empel raced for the first time in 351 days and finished fourth. Below is everything you need from round two of the HG Cross: both podiums and top tens, the men’s race lap by lap, how Schreiber and Brand rode the women’s race, what Van Empel’s return looked like on the splits, and where the winter goes next.

Meulebeke cyclocross 2026 results: both elite podiums

The elite women started at 13:45 and raced six laps. The elite men started at 15:00 and raced nine. Cyclocross Magazine reported that the course ran in the opposite direction to previous years and that the big bridge had gone, while the sandpit, steps, banks and washboard section stayed. Then the weather changed everything. A downpour before the start made the opening laps treacherous, and Sporza’s live coverage had more rain falling in the second lap of the men’s race and again in the closing laps.

That is the opposite of Dendermonde a week earlier, where a dry, fast course kept both front groups together and both races were won by one or two seconds. Vanthourenhout said afterwards that he preferred it this way. He told WielerFlits, as reported by Wielernieuws, that the rain made for a good course because there were finally real differences between riders. In the women’s race he was right. In his own race the differences only showed up behind the first four.

Read the two boards side by side. Schreiber’s winning time was 46:32 for six laps, and the women behind her finished in ones and twos: Van Alphen at 15 seconds, Brand at 30, Van Empel and Ceylin del Carmen Alvarado at 35 and 36, then nobody else within a minute. Vanthourenhout’s winning time was 1:02:28 for nine laps, and Jente Michels, Niels Vandeputte and Witse Meeussen were all one second down. Same course, same afternoon, very different races.

How Vanthourenhout won the men’s race

Vanthourenhout won a race he started badly. Cameron Mason of 777TV took the lead from the start on the wet running track, and only Michels of Alpecin-Premier Tech could follow. At the end of the first lap Sporza’s split had Mason first, Michels second and Wout Janssen ten seconds back, with Laurens Sweeck, Joran Wyseure and Vandeputte close behind. Vanthourenhout was not in the top ten. Sporza’s commentator Ruben Van Gucht said simply that he had not got away well.

The first half of the race belonged to the two leaders, and the chase behind them kept losing riders to the conditions. Vandeputte punctured on the second lap and was 21 seconds down at the end of it. Gerben Kuypers moved up from a slow start, attacked towards the leaders with Vanthourenhout helping him, and then punctured in the fourth lap. At the end of that lap Mason and Michels were still in front, with Wyseure and Vanthourenhout four seconds behind and 18-year-old Giel Lejeune 13 seconds back.

The fifth lap brought the race together. Wyseure and Vanthourenhout bridged to Mason and Michels, and for a moment there were four riders in front. Vanthourenhout attacked almost at once. It did not stick. According to Cyclingflash, the leading group never stayed the same for a full lap: Michels and Wyseure came back to him, and behind them Meeussen, Vandeputte and Lejeune kept closing. After the sixth lap Wyseure led Vanthourenhout, Michels and Mason, with Vandeputte at seven seconds. After the seventh it was Wyseure, Vanthourenhout and Michels in front and Meeussen, Mason and Vandeputte six seconds back.

Then the rain came back, and the race turned on equipment. On the eighth lap Meeussen, Vandeputte and Mason rejoined the front, and soon after that Sporza reported that Wyseure had equipment problems. The defending champion, who had led across the line after both the sixth and seventh laps, lost his chance of the win there. Kuypers, meanwhile, rode all the way back after his puncture. That made six at the front for the last lap: Vanthourenhout, Michels, Meeussen, Vandeputte, Mason and Kuypers.

Vanthourenhout attacked on the final lap and opened a small gap. Sporza saw Michels struggle to hold his wheel and then fight back on. A second acceleration followed, and Michels answered that one too. Vandeputte and Meeussen stayed in touch. Cyclingflash reported that Vanthourenhout could not shake the three of them but led into the final corner. That was the plan. He told Sporza he had put everything into the last lap and knew he had to be first onto the finishing straight. He told WielerFlits that on the last straight it was just enough. The line shows one second to Michels, Vandeputte and Meeussen together.

It was his fourth Berencross win, after 2019, 2021 and 2022, and nobody has won the race more often. It was also his second HG Cross win in two weekends. Both Wielernieuws and RTBF count it as his third win of the season. And in the Sporza interview he called the race a little heroic, because of the weather.

One second, three stories, and an 18-year-old

Three riders lost the race by the same second, and each lost it differently. Michels was racing his first cross of the season. He told Sporza he enjoyed starting straight into real cross weather, and that the last lap put him in a situation he is not yet used to and will learn from. He led or shared the lead for the first four laps with Mason and still had the legs to answer two attacks on the last one.

Vandeputte’s race turned on his second-lap puncture. He told Sporza that by the time he got back to the front he had already used a lot of energy, that he also made some tactical mistakes, and that he felt more was possible. Third place, one second down, after being 21 seconds behind on lap two, supports his reading. Meeussen of Crelan-Corendon was the one who missed the podium entirely, on the same time as second and third.

Behind the four, Kuypers was fifth at seven seconds after his puncture and chase, and Mason was sixth at ten. Mason had shaped the race more than anyone apart from the winner. He led the first lap and was in front or close to it for most of the hour. Pauwels Sauzen-Altez Industriebouw again had the winner, Kuypers in fifth and Viktor Vandenberghe and Kay De Bruyckere in 11th and 12th. Alpecin-Premier Tech took second and third.

Wyseure was the rider with the worst luck of the day. He won the Berencross in 2025, and on Saturday he was the strongest rider in the front group through the middle of the race. Cyclingflash places his mechanical on the penultimate lap. IDL Pro Cycling wrote that it forced him out of the race; Cyclocross Magazine’s results list him 14th at 1:21. Either way, it was the second weekend running that he was in the decisive group and left without the win. In Dendermonde it was a slide in the sand. In Meulebeke it was his bike.

The name most people will remember from the chase is Lejeune. He is 18, and IDL Pro Cycling notes he was third at the junior European Championships. Sporza had him eighth after one lap, seventh after two, sixth after three and fifth after four, 13 seconds behind the leaders. He was still within ten seconds of the front after seven laps. He finished eighth at 21 seconds, just behind Ryan Kamp of Bomba JOIN and ahead of Felipe Orts of Euskaltel-Euskadi. Van Gucht called it really impressive on air, and the splits back him up.

Two absences are worth noting. Joris Nieuwenhuis was on the start list but did not race. Sporza reported he had been ill the week before and had moved his season debut back a weekend. And Cyclocross Magazine reported that no North American riders started the elite men’s race.

Schreiber’s 15-second win in the women’s race

The women’s race was a test of who could stay upright, and Schreiber passed it best. She told Sporza that at the start everyone rode past her and that she was surprised by how fast they went. After two laps she was eighth, 14 seconds behind Betsema, who had attacked early and was leading with Annemarie Worst four seconds behind and Van Alphen, Brand and Inge van der Heijden close.

The favourites then started to fall away. Just after the second-lap split, Brand slid out on a corner among the trees and fell. Her team manager Sven Nys told Sporza she had been standing still for quite a long time and that it would be very difficult from there. A few minutes later Betsema got stuck twice on a steep little bank, and Sporza reported her bike started to work against her. Alvarado had already lost ground early with a mechanical, according to CyclingUpToDate. Van Alphen took the lead, and Schreiber came with her. After three laps they were first and second.

From there it was a two-rider race. After four laps Schreiber led Van Alphen, with Alvarado ten seconds back and the rest at about 20. After five laps Schreiber was three seconds clear of Van Alphen. On the last lap Van Alphen could no longer hold the wheel. ProCyclingUK noted that Schreiber was especially clean through the technical sections while Van Alphen made small errors, and on a course this slippery that was enough. Schreiber won in 46:32. Van Alphen held second at 15 seconds. She told Sporza she thought she could fight for the win, but that Schreiber was stronger at the end.

Schreiber is the Luxembourg champion and rides for Team SD Worx-Protime on the road. She told Sporza her road season was short and not very good, and that she will race a lot of cyclocross this winter. Two days earlier, ProCyclingUK reported, she had finished second to Brand at the Kermiscross in Ardooie. On Saturday the order was reversed by 30 seconds.

Brand’s third place says as much about her as a win would have. She had won her first two races of the season, in Dendermonde and Ardooie, Wielernieuws noted. After the crash she was eighth and 23 seconds down at the end of the fourth lap. On the fifth she passed Van Empel and Alvarado and was third, 17 seconds behind Schreiber. She could not get any closer, and finished third at 30 seconds. She told Sporza she was enjoying the race until she went down on her face, and that her ankle hurt a lot, but once she could push again she wanted to try.

Behind the first five, the race was spread out in a way Dendermonde never was. Van der Heijden, the European champion and the 2025 Berencross winner, was sixth at 1:12. Leonie Bentveld was seventh at 1:18 and Worst eighth at 1:21. Betsema, who led for most of the first three laps, finished ninth at 1:24. Julie Brouwers of Charles Liégeois was the best Belgian in tenth. Cyclocross Magazine reported three Americans: Mia Aseltine 19th, Kaya Musgrave 24th and Emily Shields 28th.

Fem van Empel’s return: fourth after 351 days

Van Empel’s last race before Saturday was the 2025 Koppenbergcross, where she stopped after half a lap. NOS counted 351 days between that race and Meulebeke. In that time she left her contract with Visma-Lease a Bike and travelled abroad. She told NOS she had lost her enjoyment of cycling and had taken the time to become healthy again. Sporza’s headline carried a sharper line from her: that her body could no longer handle top-level sport. She came back with a new team, Specialized TMRW.

She did not come back gently. Cyclocross Magazine had her starting 24th on the grid. She was in the top ten after one lap, and after two she was ninth, 16 seconds down, in the group behind Betsema. Sporza noted she briefly came to a stop after a mishap, which barely cost her. After four laps she was sixth at 21 seconds, after five fourth at 27. Brand passed her on the fifth lap, but she held on to fourth and beat Alvarado for it in a sprint, one second ahead.

She told Sporza she had no real expectations beforehand and called the result a bonus. She said she had missed the atmosphere of cross, the crowd and the family feeling among the riders. In CFP’s translation, she said she suffered the whole race but enjoyed it. She also said the course was different from the recon and got worse every lap, which made it a good test to start with.

What does fourth mean? On the numbers, it puts her five seconds behind Brand after a year away and ahead of Alvarado, a former world champion. She told Sporza she plans to race every week and hopes to be good enough in a few weeks to be selected for the European Championships. If you want the background on who she is and how she got here, our Fem van Empel profile has it.

What Meulebeke means for the HG Cross and the winter

Meulebeke was round two of seven in the HG Cross, which replaced the Exact Cross this season. There is no overall classification, so nobody leads anything. Five rounds remain: Heerde, Lokeren, Mol, Maldegem and Sint-Niklaas. After two of them the men’s series has one name on it twice, Vanthourenhout, and his Pauwels Sauzen team has shown it can win dry races with numbers and wet ones with a single rider.

The women’s series already has two winners. Brand won Dendermonde by one second on a dry course. Schreiber won Meulebeke by 15 on a wet one, while Brand was chasing a crash. That is a useful warning for the rest of the winter. When the courses get heavier, the rider who wins will often be the one who makes fewer mistakes, not the one with the most power.

The points start next weekend. The Superprestige opens in Overijse on 25 October, the X2O Trofee goes to the Koppenberg on 1 November and the World Cup starts on 27 November. The Koppenberg is the race where Van Empel stopped a year ago. Whether she starts there is not yet confirmed, but it would be a fitting place to test her return on a harder course.

So which result tells us more about the weeks ahead: Schreiber’s 15-second solo, or Van Empel finishing fourth in her first race back? We will update these Meulebeke cyclocross 2026 results with any corrections, and we will be back after the next round.

Sources

• Cyclocross Magazine — HG Cross Berencross 2026 results, elite women and elite men (results tables, course notes)
• Sporza — men’s live coverage, lap splits and rider interviews (Dutch)
• Sporza — women’s live coverage, lap splits and rider interviews (Dutch)
• Sporza — Fem van Empel after her return (Dutch)
• NOS — Van Empel fourth on her return after 351 days (Dutch)
• IDL Pro Cycling — Vanthourenhout wins Meulebeke; Lejeune’s ride
• IDL Pro Cycling — Van Empel’s comeback; Schreiber holds off the Dutch riders
• Cyclingflash — Vanthourenhout takes fourth win in Meulebeke
• Cyclingflash — Schreiber wins at Meulebeke, Van Empel fourth on return
• ProCyclingUK — men’s result and analysis
• ProCyclingUK — women’s result and analysis
• CyclingUpToDate — Meulebeke 2026 results and race reports
• Wielernieuws — Vanthourenhout after Meulebeke, citing WielerFlits (Dutch)
• Wielernieuws — Schreiber wins the Berencross (Dutch)
• RTBF — Vanthourenhout doubles up, Schreiber wins the women’s race (French)
• Wikipedia — Berencross winners list

Related reading

• One second, two seconds: Brand and Vanthourenhout open the winter in Dendermonde
• Who is Fem van Empel?
• Our cyclocross 2026–2027 season preview: calendars, courses and the star problem
• More race results

CFP is a cycling news digest. This report is built from the independent coverage listed above. It covers the elite men’s and elite women’s races only. Times and gaps follow Cyclocross Magazine’s results tables, published 17 October 2026. Sporza’s women’s result gives Schreiber’s winning time as 45:32; Cyclocross Magazine, Cyclingflash, ProCyclingUK and CyclingUpToDate all give 46:32, and CFP uses 46:32. Cyclocross Magazine lists Wyseure 14th at 1:21; IDL Pro Cycling wrote that his mechanical forced him out of the race. Cyclocross Magazine and CyclingUpToDate say Van Empel started 24th; Sporza says she started from the second row. Sources differ on Lejeune’s team (D.O.S. VZW in Cyclocross Magazine’s table) and on how many races Schreiber had won this season, so CFP gives neither. ProCyclingUK places Brand’s crash on the second lap; Sporza’s live timing puts it just after the second-lap split. NOS attributes Brand’s chase to a poor tyre choice; Sporza and IDL Pro Cycling report the crash, which CFP follows. Lap-by-lap gaps are Sporza’s on-screen splits as reported live. Rider comments credited to Sporza, NOS and WielerFlits are CFP’s translations from Dutch and are paraphrased. The 25 October, 1 November and 27 November series dates are from CFP’s earlier calendar reporting via Sporza and the organisers.