On stage 6 of the Giro d'Italia Donne, maglia rosa Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar Team) followed the same adage as two days before, opting to go on the attack to defend her GC lead.
She won the stage to Canelli with a 20-second gap to Lorena Wiebes (Team SD Worx), who beat Liane Lippert (Movistar Team) and Soraya Paladin (Canyon-SRAM) in the uphill sprint of the chase group.
Van Vleuten had attacked on the penultimate climb with 13km to go, quickly getting a gap on the other favourites and defending this to the finish.
Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM), stage 5 winner and second overall, and Urška Žigart (Team Jayco AlUla) had to abandon the race after a heavy crash.
In the general classification, Van Vleuten now has a lead of 3:03 minutes on Veronica Ewers (EF Education-TIBCO-SVB) and 3:39 minutes on Juliette Labous (Team DSM-Firmenich). Gaia Realini (Lidl-Trek) is just off the podium at 3:59 minutes.
“It’s super cool to win on a day that you thought before was maybe for a sprinter, and Lorena Wiebes showed that it could be – but I tried to avoid that and go for an attack. I was encouraged by my team, we woke up after yesterday’s really hard stage and came together with a plan to attack, and I’m always in for that," Van Vleuten said.
"We went for it on the 2.5-kilometre climb before the finish, and you could feel that everyone was a bit tired from yesterday, then my chances to make a difference on a short climb like that are bigger,” the overall race leader looked back on her stage-winning attack.
“I don’t think I need to gain seconds, I’m really here to enjoy the Giro, and I got the maglia rosa a bit more securely on my shoulders. I think it’s more of a battle for the podium, but I still need to be super focused. Johan Cruyff said that attack is the best way to defend, and that’s a slogan I really love,” Van Vleuten quoted another Dutch sports star to explain her race tactics despite having minutes in hand on the other GC contenders.
How it unfolded
Due to roadworks, the stage of originally 104.4km was shortened, cutting some two kilometres of gradual climbing to the finish and putting the line at the top of a steep 700-metre climb.
There were many attacks on the relatively flat first half of the stage, but only 53km from the finish did Petra Stiasny (Fenix-Deceuninck) and Elinor Barker (Uno-X Pro Cycling Team) get a gap, establishing the break of the day.
With 46km to go, Karlijn Swinkels (Team Jumbo-Visma) and Gaia Masetti (AG Insurance-Soudal Quick Step) attacked from the peloton and tried to bridge to the front. They got within 17 seconds of the front group but could not quite make it as the third-category climb to Castino kicked upwards.
Stiasny and Barker crested the climb with a 29-second advantage. On the descent, Žigart crashed into Niedermaier and Alessia Vigilia (Top Girls Fassa Bortolo). Vigilia was quickly up again, but Žigart and Niedermaier were injured more seriously and had to abandon the race.
When the break was caught 26km from the line, Team DSM-Firmenich went to the front of the peloton of about 30 riders to keep the pace high as Ewers had missed the selection and Labous saw an opportunity to move up in the overall standings.
On the penultimate climb to Calosso, Labous herself took over at the front, stringing out the group with Van Vleuten, Lippert, Realini, and Niamh Fisher-Black (Team SD Worx) on her wheel. Then Van Vleuten accelerated even further, immediately splitting the group.
Fisher-Black, Lippert, Paladin, Mavi García (Liv Racing TeqFind), Erica Magnaldi (UAE Team ADQ), Realini, and Labous formed the chase group; they were 16 seconds behind Van Vleuten at the top of the climb.
Van Vleuten could increase her advantage to 48 seconds as the second group couldn’t agree to cooperate, allowing more riders to return from behind to form a group of fifteen riders.
On the final kilometre, another group came back that included Wiebes who went on to sprint up the finishing climb, greatly reducing Van Vleuten’s gap and taking second place on the stage.
With Van Vleuten leading the overall standings as well as the points and mountain classification, Ewers will wear the maglia ciclamino on the final stage on the Italian mainland as Wiebes, second in the points classification, already has the European champion’s jersey. Fisher-Black will continue to wear the maglia verde while Niedermaier’s crash means that the maglia bianca for the best U23 rider returns to Realini.
Results
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