Behind Söderqvist, who crowned himself the first U23 world time trial champion from Sweden and dominated from start to finish, the race for the medals was much closer. Pringle, a former rower who only found a home with the rookies at the end of March this year, was just 17 tenths ahead of Decomble, who is part of Groupama-FDJ's Devo team. Riders who are already under contract in the WorldTour or ProTour are excluded - unlike in the U23 women's race. Finn, the youngest starter in the field at the age of 18, in fourth and Thornley in fifth were also within eight seconds of the lead. The victorious Swede needed 38:24 minutes for the 31.2 kilometres from Kigali - an average of 48.7 km/h.

The two German starters Louis Leidert (20) and Paul Fietzke (19) finished in 15th and 16th place, a good two and a half and almost three minutes behind the new world champion respectively. A year ago, he was beaten by the Spaniard Ivan Romeo, who competed in the elite category this year and finished eleventh. "This title was my biggest goal in the U23 era," said Söderqvist in his winner's interview. "All my preparations were geared towards it. I knew what I could do. It's all about pacing. And as a time trial specialist, I was able to pace myself well on this difficult course with the tough finale." Söderqvist took at least another 20 seconds off the competition on the final climb alone.

World Championship 2025 - Individual time trial U23 men results

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This is how the U23 men's individual time trial at the 2025 World Championships went

Once again, the hosts kicked things off. Etienne Tuyizere was the first of 61 starters to tackle the same course that the elite women had to complete the day before. 43:37 minutes was the first benchmark, which was shortly followed by China's You Li. Jaka Marolt from Slovenia took away a lot of time - 42:13 minutes were to be beaten.

Only Mateusz Gajdulewicz from Poland managed this again. In 32:25 minutes, he delivered a strong time, which Fietzke also managed to beat shortly afterwards. However, the 19-year-old had to change his bike on the way due to technical problems. After that, however, the gap of minutes turned into seconds. The Canadian Jonas Walton was just over a second faster than Gajdulewicz.

Walton had to make way for Nate Pringle a few minutes later. And he stayed behind for a long time. Because Decomble, who was even faster at the first split time, was a hair's breadth behind in the end. He was less than two tenths off the pace. But the Frenchman will be able to get over it. Because only Söderqvist was faster, which gave him bronze and the Swede the title in superior style.