Boels Ladies Tour: Van Vleuten wins prologue

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Annemiek van Vleuten (Orica-Scott) claimed a hometown victory in the prologue of the Boels Ladies Tour in Wageningen, the Netherlands on Tuesday, seeing off European champion Ellen van Dijk (Sunweb) by four seconds and Lisa Brennauer (Canyon-SRAM) by 10 seconds in the 4.3km test.

The Dutch champion started her race more than an hour before the last rider, UCI Women's WorldTour leader Anna van der Breggen (Boels Dolmans), and after setting the fastest time had a long and tense wait before being declared the winner when Van der Breggen crossed the line 14 seconds slower.

"To be able to win in your home town is really great," Van Vleuten said. "I felt some pressure so to come away with the win is really nice. I heard my name cheered a lot around the course, it is my home town so it is very special.

"I went full gas on the straight parts and didn't take big risks on the corners. They were a little bit dangerous so I don't think anybody did because the world championships is the next goal to be there in top shape."

Van Vleuten showed that her strength in time trialing is at a peak, and looked forward to the stage 3 time trial that is 16.9km in length to further open up the overall classification.

"I think the two stages at the end of the week will be really interesting and there you can make some differences if you're in really good shape," van Vleuten continued. "We have a really good team here and I am really pleased about that, I have the strongest team I could have so we will just go for it this week."

Van Dijk put in a strong ride, but said she missed out on the technical sections in the second half of the stage.

"Of course I would have liked to have taken the win but in a prologue everything has to go right to do so. I felt good out on the course but I lost quite a bit of time on the final technical part. Nevertheless I feel like I did a good race and am looking forward to the rest of the week," Van Dijk said. "It’s good to see that we start the tour in a good position as a team."

Van Dijk's teammate Floortje Mackaij was the best young rider on the stage, finishing at 27 seconds from Van Vleuten.

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