Elisa Longo Borghini (Lidl-Trek) continued her flying start to the 2024 season as she powered away from Demi Vollering (SD Worx-Protime) on the penultimate climb to win De Brabantse Pijl Women.
It looked like a repeat of the sprint a deux from last year’s Liège-Bastogne-Liège was on the cards until the Italian made a final burst 8km from the line up the Holstheide and left Vollering behind, unable to respond.
It’s been a long road back to top form for Longo Borghini after a torrid 2023 season where she struggled with illness and injury, but her shape seems to be at its absolute peak heading into the Ardennes Classics.
She adds a first triumph at Brabantse Pijl to victories this season from the Tour of Flanders and Trofeo Oro. Vollering stayed away from the peloton to take second with Alexandra Manly (Liv AlUla Jayco) rounding out the podium from the group sprint behind.
The Italian was full of praise for her teammates after Lidl-Trek once again proved they can use their numbers better than anyone else in the women’s WorldTour at the moment. Well-timed attacks and strong lead-outs into climbs have characterised an extremely successful spring so far for the American squad.
“It was a very strong team performance again and we showed it in Flanders. Today we really wanted to have a kind of open race but we planned an attack at kilometre 85 with the team and then we did it again on the Moskesstraat,” Longo Borghini said.
“Big credit today to my teammates, everyone was really committed to doing well. We were relaxed but really determined.”
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“This victory is for my husband Jacopo [Mosca], he’s on the Teide training and I hope to see him very soon. It's for a silly reason, he’s surname is Mosca and today we were on the Moskesstraat,” she laughed.
Despite her advantage over Vollering on the day, Longo Borghini made sure not to underestimate the Dutchwoman with bigger races still to come.
“She [Vollering] looked really strong and did a really good race. She’s a rider I have a lot of respect for,” Longo Borghini said.
“Today I was stronger, tomorrow she will be stronger. It's like this in cycling.”
The Italian champion will race all three of the Ardennes in the coming week, starting with Sunday’s Amstel Gold Race before she heads to La Flèche Wallonne midweek and Liège-Bastogne-Liège next week.
How it unfolded
A four-rider group got up the road inside the opening 40km of racing with Coryn Labecki (EF Education-Cannondale), Karin Söderqvist (Lifeplus Wahoo), Laura Molenaar (VolkerWessels Women's Pro Cycling Team) and Emily Watts (Chevalmeire)getting ahead on the Eigenbrakelsesteenweg climb.
Vollering showed her hand as early as with 65km to go, launching some warning shots off the front of the peloton once they reached the hilly local laps in and around the finishing location, Overijse.
FDJ-Suez and Lidl-Trek proved to be the strongest squads on the day, leading the peloton for much of the middle phases as the gap to the breakaway melted swiftly away.
Small groups and solo attacks would try their luck inside 40km to go with Sofia Bertizzolo (UAE Team ADQ) and Alessia Vigilia (FDJ - SUEZ) eventually finding their way to the remnants of the front group.
The action was bubbling over behind in the group of favourites as Shirin van Anrooij and Longo Borghini combined on one of the four ascents of the Moskesstraat climb. The Italian champion made one attack but Vollering could match it as the rest of the peloton struggled.
Vollering made her next big move on the S-Bocht Overijse with the peloton not too far behind, dropping three of the four former leaders on the road. Longo Borghini had the power to go with her as did Vigilia despite the latter looking in a world of pain.
The FDJ Suez rider would stay in the leading group for the next 10km but on the final ascent of the Moskesstraat, the pressure from Vollering and Longo Borghini proved too much to handle.
Longo Borghini showed no signs of slowing down despite Vollering leading up the first few hundred metres of the short 500-metre effort and with 7.9km to go, dropped Vollering up the Holstheide.
The Dutch champion had no response and looked down as the Italian powered up the road away from her and the peloton to ride solo into Overijse.
James Moultrie is a gold-standard NCTJ journalist who joined Cyclingnews as a News Writer in 2023 after originally contributing as a freelancer for eight months, during which time he also wrote for Eurosport, Rouleur and Cycling Weekly. Prior to joining the team he reported on races such as Paris-Roubaix and the Giro d’Italia Donne for Eurosport and has interviewed some of the sport’s top riders in Chloé Dygert, Lizzie Deignan and Wout van Aert. Outside of cycling, he spends the majority of his time watching other sports – rugby, football, cricket, and American Football to name a few.
