Zoe Bäckstedt (Canyon-SRAM) claimed the overall title at the Baloise Ladies Tour for the second year in a row while Nienke Veenhoven (Visma-Lease a Bike) sprinted to her third stage victory on stage 4 in Mechelen.
Veenhoven timed her sprint perfectly, overtaking Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx-Protime) to take the win by half a wheel. Charlotte Kool (Fenix-PremierTech) was second, and Maike van der Duin (Canyon-SRAM) was third.
Bäckstedt made her mark in the time trial stages, winning the prologue and then the 8.4km TT on stage 3a, where she retook the leader’s jersey. By virtue of the time bonus seconds at the finish line, Veenhoven moved up to second overall, as Felicity Wilson-Haffendel (Lidl-Trek) finished third.
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"We’ve been on the podium every stage, some victories for me and some pretty good results for Maike in the sprints as well. Honestly, this week has been really good," Bäckstedt said.
"We had the leader’s jersey and we had a really strong team. I feel that we had to be in control and we really played it well every day."
For its final stage, the race moved back to the centre of Belgium, stage 4 starting and finishing in Mechelen. Consisting of six local laps totalling 111.4km, the race included five passages of the cobbled Keizerstraat, and was almost completely flat.
With the flag dropped, a group quickly got away: Sterre Vervloet (Lotto-Intermarché), Maaike Boogaard (VolkerWessels), Yonna van Dam (Citymesh-Customm), April Tacey (Hitec-Fluid Control), Aileen Schweikart (REMBE-rad net) and, briefly, Emmy Pordon (KDM-Pack), who dropped later on as she could not stay with the pace.
Though the five built up a maximum lead of 2:20, they were kept on a tight leash of around 1:30 by riders from the sprinters’ teams Visma-Lease a Bike and Fenix-Premier Tech along with Bäckstedt’s Canyon-SRAM. The gap was down to one minute with two laps to go.
Just as the break was about to be reeled in with 17 kilometres to go, Schweikart accelerated to continue on solo as leadout trains organised at the front to finally catch the German rider after another 15 kilometres.
Teams battled for control until SD Worx-ProTime took the front under the red kite, but were overtaken by other teams.
Kopecky launched her sprint with 150 metres to go but Veenhoven overtook her to take her third stage win.
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