It started with a text…
On Thursday afternoon, Kim Le Court-Pienaar stormed to her second Tour de France Femmes stage victory in two years, outpacing seven other riders in an elite breakaway group in Tournon-sur-Rhône.
Some 19 hours earlier, very late on Wednesday night, Le Court-Pienaar had texted her team directeur sportif Jolien d'Hoore that she had winning on her mind. Last summer, she scored the first Tour stage win of her career in Guéret, sprinting home and into yellow from a similarly select small group at the end of another hilly day.
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Now, win number two is in the bag, and, while she may not be back in the maillot jaune, she's moving up in the GC, back into the top 10.
"It's true that last night, I was actually already kind of asleep, and then I woke up again, and I decided to message Jolien, and I told her, 'Yeah, I want to win tomorrow. I really want to,' " Le Court-Pienaar said in the post-stage conference.
"The GC, of course, we are here for the GC ambitions, but we're going to take it day-by-day. I'm going to try and enjoy today and then just see what tomorrow brings. And of course, there are a few more stages that suit me, so we'll see."
Le Court-Pienaar, who leads AG Insurance-Soudal's charge after finishing 16th last time out, said that adding another stage win to her palmarès was a major goal for her this week – in addition to her open-ended GC quest.
Stage 5's brutal race through the Jura hills, where she finished 1:43 behind winner Demi Vollering, topped her hitlist, but success the following day is just as sweet.
"We've been wanting to win a stage already since stage 1. Yesterday was really a big goal for me," she said.
"It was the only stage in the Tour I did the full recon, and I really liked the stage. But I had a tough day in the TT, and I was still trying to recover yesterday. I really had a tough day on the bike."
This time around, Le Court-Pienaar chased back from a mechanical issue on the descent of the stage's penultimate hill, the Col de Lalouvesc. She made it back on at the top of the final climb of the Côte de Boucieu-le-Roi, 16.5km from the line, but then missed the decisive move, having burned too many matches.
The likes of Elisa Longo-Borghini, Célia Gery, and queen of the mountains Puck Pieterse went clear. However, Le Court-Pienaar's distinctive jersey was soon in the move, in tandem with Riejanne Markus, the Dutchwoman once again on the offensive following her last-gasp defeat in Geneva.
"I was very lucky to have two teammates with me, plus another one who came back from the peloton. So they all sacrificed themselves for me, and it was truly a collective effort. Without them, I would have never made it back to the peloton, and I thank them enormously. It was really a team effort," Le Court-Pienaar said.
"Once I caught my breath, I saw that Riejanne Markus had attacked, and I knew that was a good wheel. If she goes, there's a 99% chance she reaches the front. Together we worked hard, got to the front, and worked together."
From there, the move was away and on course for the win, though of course more attacks flew before they reached Tournon-sur-Rhône, with Le Court-Pienaar, Markus, and Cédrine Kerbaol all on the move. In the closing sprint, though, there was no question over who would triumph, despite her earlier exertions.
"At one point I looked behind me, there was a gap, and I didn't quite understand why they were letting me go, so I tried to go solo. But yeah, it's a shame Liane closed it down, but that's how it is, that's racing," she said.
"When Riejanne Markus attacked, nobody wanted to close her down, and I know that with less than a kilometre to go, if you give her 5 seconds, she's gone. I had to close it down myself again.
"At that moment I was a bit stressed because I was really at the end of my strength, and I was already imagining my sports director telling me, 'Ah, you wasted too much energy, and that's why you didn't win the race.'
"I already had that feeling and that picture in my head. And I said to myself, 'Ah no, I'm not going to lose, not after all the team's effort, all the work I've done, and the sacrifices to get here.' So I'm glad it worked out."
As champion of Mauritius, an island nation in the Indian Ocean with no top-level cycling history to speak of, Le Court-Pienaar has amassed some following.
After racing to the very top of the sport with successes at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the Tour, and elsewhere, Le Court-Pienaar built a colourful and fervent following at races, with crowds brandishing the bright colours of the national flag.
"It's incredible. Since stage 1, they've been everywhere. My team keeps saying they come out of nowhere; they're just there," Le Court-Pienaar said.
"No, it's incredible. Last year, there were already quite a few flags, but this year it's really another level. I feel like I'm not even in France; I feel like I'm in Mauritius sometimes."
Le Court-Pienaar will look to draw on that support on Friday, with the ascent of Mont Ventoux posing another challenge entirely. On the queen stage of last year's Tour, she dropped nine minutes plus the race lead on the road to the summit of the Col de la Madeleine.
"I've only done it once, so I don't have a lot of experience, and I'm maybe glad about that," she said of the Giant of Provence.
"But I think it's going to be tough. I think, of course, we've seen in every Tour de France it plays on the big mountains.
"I don't want to focus too much on the others; I just want to focus on myself and just do the best we can. We have big ambitions, so we're just going to keep on fighting every day, and hopefully the legs feel like today."
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