Despite losing the white jersey of the best Under 23 rider on the final day of the UAE Tour, Zoe Bäckstedt was pleased with her ride up the Jebel Hafeet climb.
The Canyon-SRAM-zondacrypto rider had been in the white jersey of best young rider since finishing third on stage 1 of the UAE Tour Women in Madinat Zayed on Thursday. She then followed that with 11th on stage 2, but finally ceded the classification to Eleonora Ciabocco (Picnic-PostNL) as the race's final test hit its steepest slopes.
Bäckstedt’s ride on the mountain was an impressive one: she held on to the climbers' group longer than any of the other sprinters, and even outlasted some of the climbers themselves. However, the aim had been to maintain her lead in the young rider classification, and the day was tinged with a slight regret.
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"I just wanted to see what I could do, I wanted to see if I could hold onto white," Bäckstedt said after a post-stage debrief with teammates Kasia Niewiadoma and Neve Bradbury.
"I didn't in the end because there was one little under-23 in there who's really good at climbing, so it was maybe not what I hoped. It's also nice to attempt a climb like this, a 10km climb in 30º (C) is not normally my thing. I'm pretty good at stages like stage 1, not like today, but in the end, I have to say it was a good day for me.
"I think I impressed myself a little bit, really pushing the whole time, just trying to see how much pain I could put my body through. I really put myself through it, almost wanting to throw up at the finish here."
With the climb as the final challenge, the 156km stage, which started at the football stadium in Al Ain, was largely uneventful. An early solo breakaway preceded a series of sporadic attacks, all of which were brought to heel.
"It was brutal," Bäckstedt said. "Super easy to start and then basically full gas into the bottom of the climb, then straight into the climb, and it was super hard. There were a few attempts to split it, but there was just not enough wind to split it today."
The team plan had been to ride for Niewiadoma. The former Tour de France Femmes winner is obviously one of the best climbers in the peloton. While she tried gamely, attacking eventual winner, Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ) several times, the Polish champion was unable to hold onto the front group, eventually finishing fifth on the stage and overall.
It was, however, a good week for the team as a whole, Canyon-SRAM bagging the team classification, with Niewiadoma, Bäckstedt and Bradbury all finishing inside the top 30 on general classification.
