Hatherly, Lill hit World Cup podium to boost confidence ahead of Olympics

Olympic medal contenders Alan Hatherly and Candice Lill boosted their stocks ahead of the Paris Games by scooping three medals at the World Cup mountain bike event at Les Gets in France at the weekend.

Evergreen veteran Greg Minnaar, at the age of 42, added a bronze in the downhill event.

Hatherly landed two golds, winning the cross-country Olympic race as well as the cross-country short-track.

Lill placed second in the women’s cross-country race. 

Hatherly crossed the line in 1hr 23min 14sec, well ahead of Tokyo Olympic silver medallist Mathias Fluckiger of Switzerland in 1:24:45 and Denmark’s Simon Andreassen in 1:25:16.

Hatherly’s winning gap was tighter in the short-track, clocking 21:28 ahead of Briton Charlie Aldridge in 21:32.

Lill finished in 1:31:49 behind Puck Pieterse of the Netherlands, the 2022 under-23 world champion who won in 1:29:12. Thirty seconds behind her was Swiss star Alessandra Keller, who heads the World Cup standings after six legs.

Pieterse, who missed the first two legs, is lying second.

Lill is fifth.