CHIARA OPENS & CLOSES TOUR OF BRITAIN ON THE PODIUM

After an exceptional lead-out from teammate supreme Zoe Bäckstedt, Chiara Consonni sprinted to third on the fifth and final stage of the Tour of Britain Women.

A well-executed team plan in the closing kilometres even saw Zoe able to cross the line in an impressive fourth, round off a strong final day for CANYON//SRAM and bringing Chiara’s week full circle after her runner-up finish on the opening stage.

The 27-year-old Italian was delighted with today’s outcome:

“I’m really happy, especially after a month that’s been pretty full-gas. Today, I needed to ‘finalise’ as much as possible the work that all the girls did. They were really strong, especially Zoe in the last three corners. I think I missed something in the legs today, but overall I’m really happy with my Tour of Britain.

The plan was to take the last corner in front, and we did. The whole team motivated me to keep going for more, so I tried my best in the sprint, but everyone knows that Lorena [Wiebes] is just really strong. We still need to be happy about the team performance, and what I did.”

The Tour of Britain, a unique and eagerly anticipated fixture on the calendar, made the move from May to August this year, starting just 10 days after the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift. As the final WorldTour stage race on European soil this season, the peloton arrived with a mix of motivations: some riders had sat out the action in France and arrived fresh and hungry to race, while others carried the momentum of having raced themselves into weary but strong form over the previous fortnight.

One of those riders was Chiara, who immediately showed that the legs were firing by sprinting to second on a long 159km stage 1 behind the ever-dominant Wiebes (SDW). More impressively, she survived a brutal final 25km in which relentless attacks ripped apart the peloton, with other teams throwing everything at the race in an attempt to prevent an inevitable bunch sprint.

After a tumultuous stage 2, characterised by stereotypically British conditions – persistent rain, heavy roads and foreboding skies – as well as periods of delay and neutralisation, Chiara couldn’t quite recreate her opening-day success. Caught in the chaos of the sprinters’ skirmish, she ultimately finished sixth.

The following two stages offered slightly different challenges terrain-wise, with the team turning its focus towards Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig as leader. On stage 3, the dynamic Dane delivered a strong fifth place on a short but fascinating 105km route that culminated atop The Great Orme, a spectacular limestone headland rising dramatically above the Irish Sea in Wales.

The decisive move came immediately after a technical turn into the base of the 2.5km climb, with Le Court Pienaar (AGS) launching her stage – and ultimately general classification (GC) – winning attack in the mere metres that followed. Cecilie managed her effort expertly from there, emptying the tank to finish fifth, 23 seconds behind the Mauritian. The result elevated Cecilie to eighth on the GC, level on time with sixth and just two seconds shy of the top five.

After a relentlessly rolling and unpredictable 138km stage 4 through Welsh heartland, where Cecilie finished safely inside a 30-rider peloton, the final 124km stage 5 had a bunch sprint written all over it. Even so, the peloton was still blown apart on the two category 2 climbs, with Cecilie again climbing among the best, while a menacing three-rider break held a one-minute advantage with just 10km to go.

Behind the scenes, Wilma Aintila, Justyna Czapla and Soraya Paladin ensured that Chiara remained safely inside the peloton, and also assisted with chasing the break, setting up the desired sprint finish.

As the line drew near, Zoe had one final engine-rev left in her – a fitting conclusion to a special week spent racing as British National Champion on home soil, and for two days in her home-home country of Wales. Here’s how she reflected on the fifth stage, and an unexpectedly strong finish of her own:

“The plan was for Wilma to lead from 1.3km to almost the corner at 700m, and then I’d take over until 300m, for Conso [Chiara] to then open up. But, I was in a good position and overtook Wilma into that corner at 1.3km. It was a weird sprint because the road was quite big, with not so many riders left from other teams, so I managed to move up sooner.

Conso was not in my wheel, but I looked behind at one point and she had managed to fight her way there – this was probably with just under 1km to go. I could just start to see the final right-hand turn, so I went super hard towards it. I was like, ‘okay, the plan was that I need to be the first one through the corner at 300m, so I’m going to be the first one through the corner at 300m.’ I went full gas from one corner to the next, and hoped that Conso could then take over, but I think it’s been a hard few weeks for everyone’s legs!”

In a sport where plans rarely go exactly to plan, this one went quite to script, although Zoe’s own finish was much less predictable:

“And then, I finished fourth! I saw Lorena and Conso come past me and I thought, ‘okay, I’m done. I ride easy.’ Then Lara [Gillespie] came past me, but afterwards, no one, no one, no one… I looked behind and thought, ‘oh, maybe I should continue sprinting,’ so I kept going seated. I couldn’t stand up again.

In the end, it was only a seated drive to the line, but I got fourth! So yeah, I’m also really happy with that. It was my best one minute of the year, and that was before I started going for the sprint!”

While Zoe finished just behind Chiara, with Gillespie [UAE] and Wiebes ahead of them in the stage standings, the bigger picture saw Cecilie secure eighth on GC – still level on time with sixth and just a whisker from the top five.

All and all, it was an encouraging week of performances and results, with a few team UCI races to come, and the biggest championship tests of the season still firmly on the horizon.