Stage 3 of the Giro d’Italia Women saw the GC favourites coming to the fore for the first time in the nine-day race. The climb to Montenars, 1.9km at an average 9.1% with the steepest parts at 16%, saw an elite selection, but the four top favourites did not push on after the climb and instead saved their strength for Tuesday’s mountain time trial.
Demi Vollering (FDJ United-Suez) accelerated 300 metres from the top and was followed by Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ), Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime), and Marlen Reusser (Movistar). At the top of the climb, Femke de Vries (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Niamh Fisher-Black (Lidl-Trek) were two seconds behind, with Isabella Holmgren (Lidl-Trek) following another three seconds down.
Vollering’s move had been prepared by her teammate Célia Gery, who set a hard pace from the start of the climb and split the peloton. Other than the riders mentioned above, Marion Bunel (Visma-Lease a Bike) could still follow Gery’s pace, and Lore De Schepper (AG Insurance-Soudal), Monica Trinca Colonel (Liv AlUla Jayco), and Lauren Dickson (FDJ United-Suez) were only a few seconds down.
When Gery swung off 500 metres from the top, world road champion Magdeleine Vallieres (EF Education-Oatly) was 10 seconds behind, followed by Viktória Chladoňová (Visma-Lease a Bike), Amber Kraak (FDJ United-Suez), and Mavi García (UAE Team ADQ) 12 seconds down.
The next group of six riders was 22 seconds behind, and it wasn’t possible to positively identify all of them at that distance from the camera motorbike. Urška Žigart (AG Insurance-Soudal) and Sigrid Ytterhus Haugset (Uno-X Mobility) were definitely part of this group, the SD Worx-Protime rider was likely Valentina Cavallar, and the Laboral Kutxa-Fundación Euskadi rider will have been either Debora Silvestri or Tiril Jørgensen.
Barbara Malcotti (Human Powered Health) was still further down, but the short, steep climb did not suit her: She prefers longer, steadier climbs, so we shouldn’t read too much into this.
Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM) completely missed the selection, but this was through no fault of her own: The German climber had suffered a puncture only a few kilometres before the climb and was still making her way through the peloton up the climb.
After the climb, De Vries, Fisher-Black, and Holmgren quickly got back in touch with the front four. De Schepper and Trinca Colonel also returned on the descent; the rest coalesced into a larger group that made it back to the front after a few kilometres of chasing.
When asked after the stage why the GC favourites did not push on after the climb, Reusser replied in her trademark deadpan delivery: “It’s the group of the GC. There was nobody that missed out where you want to really keep that person away. You don’t want to be the one that is missing it. It’s always a bit difficult,” she explained.
The Montenars climb was a first test of the climbing legs, but with over 20km of mostly flat roads before the finish and a 12.7km climbing time trial coming up, it did not make sense to continue.
Stage 4 from Belluno to Nevegal, starting at an altitude of 387 metres and finishing at 1047 metres, will provide the first real-time gaps and show if the first indications on Montenars hold true.
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