Women's Tour: Sarah Roy wins in Chesterfield

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Sarah Roy (Orcia Scott) won stage 4 at the Women's Tour Saturday by outsprinting her two breakaway companions on the uphill finish in Derbyshire. Boels Dolmans' Christine Majerus was second, followed by Team Sunweb's Leah Kirchmann in third. Ale Cipollini's Marta Bastianelli won the field sprint for fourth, 17 seconds behind the winner.

WM3 Pro Cycling's Kasia Niewiadoma finished safely in the bunch to maintain her overall lead of 1:25 over Majerus. Kirchmann is now third overall, 1:36 back.

"It feels so good to get our first WorldTour victory," Roy said. "The whole team has been working really hard and we have come very close so many times this season and it's a big relief to get off the mark. The girls have been wonderful and I'm really happy.”

Roy joined three other in a move that escaped the bunch with about 40km remaining. The quartet built a maximum gap of 1:50, but concerted chasing from the sprinters' teams whittled the advantage to three remaining escapees down to a handful of seconds in the closing kilometres. Nevertheless, the trio up front persisted, and came to the line with a 17-second advantage. 

"I saw an opportunity when the break was being formed and we immediately started to work well together," Roy said. “I had a lot of support from the team car on the radio and that information was invaluable."

In the finale, Roy's acceleration opened a one-second gap over Majerus at the line, with Kirchmann coming in five seconds in arrears.

"It wasn't as technical as previous days," Roy said of the finish. "But I made Majerus lead and I started my sprint from around 300 metres and created enough of a gap to hold on."

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