In her final year as a professional cyclist, Grace Brown (Australia) stormed to the biggest win of her career to become the women’s Olympic time trial Champion in Paris, destroying the field on slippery roads with a stunning time of 39:38 and an average speed of 49kph.
Brown scorched off the start line in Les Invalides to set the fastest time at the first intermediate check, five seconds faster than World Champion Chloé Dygert (USA) and 20 quicker than eventual silver medallist Anna Henderson (Great Britain).
However, at the second time check exiting the Bois de Vincennes park, Brown had scorched through the Paris streets to extend her gap on Henderson to 51 seconds.
Disaster then struck for Dygert, who crashed just ahead of this point as the road surface changed from tarmac to cobblestones, coming down hard and losing significant time on the Australian to also come through the time check 51 seconds behind Brown.
For Brown, 32, the green time splits only got greener as she continued to charge through to the line over the Pont Alexandre III, beating Henderson’s previous best time by a stunning margin of 1:31, with Dygert still managing a medal but only bronze as she came over the line 1:32 behind Brown who was simply in a league of her own on the wet roads.
“I think it's sinking in now that I'm speaking to everyone and like, you know, replaying the race and just understanding a bit the significance of winning a gold medal, it's a really big deal,” said Brown post-race.
“Just thinking of all the people that have supported me to this point and really, you know, put their belief in what I can do here and given me the strength to go after it. To repay everyone with a gold medal, it's just awesome.
"I felt really strong and was able to execute everything exactly how I planned. So, yeah, it was almost a perfect race "
For Brown, the 1:31 winning gap was equally as impressive to her as all those watching, especially after narrowly missing out on a rainbow jersey in the past two seasons: “The margin is insane to be honest, like, especially since like the last two world championships, I've come second by five seconds and 12 seconds,” she said.
“So even like the last 10km I was just pushing myself with ‘every second counts, every second counts, don't back off’ because even though I was ahead, it can come around pretty quickly as well.”
How it unfolded
The action got going on the time trial even before the first rider, Urska Pintar (Slovenia), rolled down the start ramp in front of Les Invalides, with the rain that soaked the opening ceremony on Friday night continuing to fall from Saturday morning through to the ITTs start at 14:30 local time.
Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig (Denmark) was the first big name from the Women’s WorldTour to get going as fifth off the start ramp, however, a crash nearly halfway into her effort exposed just how tough and slippery the conditions were going to be.
It was actually USA triathlete Taylor Knibb, performing in two sports at this Olympics, who set the early benchmark time at the first intermediate time check some 30 seconds ahead of Marta Lach (Poland) and 51 from Uttrup Ludwig.
But the same corner which did for the Dane also saw Knibb slide out and lose time. Things would get worse for the American as a second crash followed soon after, then a third. The final nail in the coffin to her torrid time on the course was a puncture and her mechanic even slipping over on the ice-rink-like roads as he tried to hand over her spare bike.
As the crashes came up in front, some of the big names were starting their efforts, with Ellen Van Dijk (Netherlands) and Audrey Cordon Ragot (France) among those getting going on the 32.4km course.
However, their times weren’t holding up to that of Knibb, with the American still holding the fastest time at T1 until the big guns came through and Lotte Kopecky (Belgium) and Elisa Longo Borghini (Italy) went faster.
After Knibb’s nightmare day out, Lach and then Eugenia Bujak (Slovenia) went into the hot seat as the fastest early finishers.
The crashes weren’t over, however, with Kopecky also sliding out just in front of a zebra crossing. But behind her, a home favourite Juliette Labous (France) had gone just one second slower at the time check to the delight of the fans in Paris.
TT specialist Mieke Kröger (Germany) then set the new benchmark with a time of 42:28 at the finish, some 26 seconds faster than the previous best. But this was quickly smashed out of the park by Kim Cadzow (New Zealand) with a time 42 seconds faster than that of the German - 41:46.
The favourites began to outdo each other behind, with Hendeson and Brown both setting new times at the first time check. Brown was even going so fast to the point where she set a faster time than that of Dygert at T1.
Labous and Demi Vollering (Netherlands) did brilliantly between the first and second time checks to set the provisional best times ahead of Longo Borhgini and Kopecky, with chants of ‘Juliette! Juliette!’ aiding the French rider to a 28:11 at T2.
Henderson then again overtook this 11 seconds faster but Brown and Dygert weren’t far behind her and the Australian was in a completely different league, destroying the Brit's time by 51 seconds.
Only Dygert could stop her now but 26 minutes into her effort, she was also a victim of the wet roads, sliding out on a change of surface from tarmac to cobblestones and crashing to see gold disappear.
With gold now looking certain for Brown, new fastest times were constantly being set at the finish. First by Kopecky, who knocked Kadzow off of the top spot, then French rider Labous, who bested the Belgian with hopes of a medal.
However, to the crowd's disappointment, this didn’t last long with the specialists now coming in. Henderson set a brilliant new fastest time of 41:09, ten seconds faster than Labous. With only Brown and Dygert looking like possible threats to top spot, GB had secured another medal on day one of the Paris Olympics.
Brown was in a different world of strength as she finished clearly for a certain gold, while a now struggling Dygert faded down to third at the finish behind the Aussie and Brit, even taking time to gingerly get of her bike with clear pain in her left leg - where she sustained her serious injury in 2020.
Results
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