Marlen Reusser is back in the maglia rosa after a strong performance on the second of three summit finishes at the Giro d'Italia Women.
The Movistar leader climbed to third place on stage 4, behind the day's winner Sarah Gigante (AG Insurance-Soudal) and defending champion Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ) atop Pianezze, but it was all she needed to retake the overall race lead.
"I’m really happy to be back in the maglia rosa; that was the goal today, and as a team, we worked hard to achieve it. We had planned to set a strong pace at the start of the climb, and that’s exactly what happened. Liane Lippert did an incredible job," Reusser said.
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The Swiss rider had already pulled on the leader's jersey after winning the stage 1 time trial in Bergamo, but Anna Henderson (Lidl-Trek) took it off her shoulders following her breakaway victory on stage 2 at the summit in Aprica.
Reusser had dropped into second overall but remained a close 13 seconds behind Henderson at the start of the fourth stage, a 142km from Castello Tesino to the top of Pianezze, Valdobbiadene, a climb that averaged 7% but had pitches as steep as 11%.
Reusser has demonstrated her climbing strengths throughout her racing career and has recently won overall titles at the Vuelta a Burgos and the Tour de Suisse.
After transferring teams from SD Worx-Protime to Movistar, Reusser came into this Giro d'Italia as an outright leader and has a very clear target of winning the overall title by the time the race reaches Imola on Sunday. However, she said the Giro was also her target last year, but a crash at the Tour of Flanders, followed by COVID-19, set her back for much of the season.
"It's pretty obvious to put the Giro was a main goal. This was already the case with SD Worx [in 2024]. I should have been the leader for last year's Giro, but as you may know, I was out almost the whole year, so I missed it," Reusser told Cyclingnews.
"With Movistar, from the beginning of the year, we said that because the Giro has both a time trial and pretty hard climbing stages, that it's, for sure, something we should tackle with me. So, this was for sure from the beginning, the plan."
Reusser also told Cyclingnews that she has previewed the next mountaintop finish, which will be held on stage 7 at Monte Nerone, an 8km ascent averaging over 8% to the finish.
Currently, she leads the overall classification by 16 seconds over Longo Borghini, 34 seconds ahead of Gigante, and 1:03 ahead of Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto).
"I did recon stages 6 and 7, and I know what kind of riders my competitors are from almost everybody, that is strong. And I really think it's hard to say now how we will race it, because it depends on the situation. I would know what I would have to try. But in the end, you also need to have the legs, and we will see who has the legs. I don't know who is going to have the legs," she said.
Reusser was asked to look ahead and speculate what could happen in the overall classification during the last four stages, to which she replied, "Looking at the stages ahead, we can’t predict what will happen. Tomorrow, for example, I don’t expect major changes in the general classification, but it’s still a day where you can lose something if you’re not in position. We’ll take it one day at a time, but I believe the final victory will come down to the current top four in the GC."
The Giro d'Italia Women continues on Thursday with stage 5, a flat 120km race from Mirano to Monselice.
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