Giro d'Italia Donne: Ashleigh Moolman Pasio wins queen stage 9 atop Monte Matajur

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Ashleigh Moolman Pasio (SD Worx) has won stage 9 of the Giro d'Italia Donne, arguably the biggest success of her career. She finished ahead of her SD Worx teammates Demi Vollering in second and maglia rosa Anna  van der Breggen in third. 

Marta Cavalli (FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope) was fourth with Lizzie Deignan (Trek-Segafredo) in fifth place.

“Wow, it feels so amazing. This is my tenth Giro, and I have never won a stage before! I have only ever finished second. I am also second on the GC, but it is really special to win a stage,” Moolman Pasio said.

Moolman Pasio attacked with Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek-Segafredo) on the penultimate Stregna climb, cresting 41km from the finish, and the two riders started the daunting Monte Matajur finishing climb with a two-minute advantage on the peloton.

Moolman-Pasio dropped Longo Borghini with 8km to go and continued alone to win the stage, with teammate and overall leader Anna van der Breggen controlling the group of favourites behind.

Van der Breggen heads into the finale stage 10 on Sunday with a firm hold on the maglia rosa ahead of her teammates Moolman Pasio and Vollering.

How it unfolded

Covering 122.6km from the start in Feletto Umberto to the finish on the Monte Matajur, the penultimate stage of the 2021 Giro Donne was the hardest of the race with the second-category climb of Stregna followed by the tough first-category finishing climb.

Letizia Borghesi (Aromitalia Basso Bikes Vaiano), Asia Zontone (Servetto-Makhymo-Beltrami TSA), and Giorgia Vettorello (Top Girls Fassa Bortolo) formed the day’s breakaway. 

Their maximum advantage was 3:28 minutes with 50km to go, but this gap went down again even before the Stregna climb where Borghesi dropped her two companions. She was caught about two kilometres from the top of the climb.

Longo Borghini and Moolman Pasio then attacked from the peloton, cresting the climb with a 30-second advantage on a group of about 35 riders including the maglia rosa. 

Elise Chabbey (Canyon-SRAM) and Lucinda Brand (Trek-Segafredo) tried to bridge to the front on the descent but were reeled in again. A crash on the downhill brought down Sofia Bertizzolo (Liv Racing) and Clara Koppenburg (Rally Cycling), and the latter had to abandon the race with a suspected collarbone fracture.

Longo Borghini and Moolman-Pasio extended their advantage on the flat section between the two climbs, starting the ascent of the Monte Matajur 2:18 minutes ahead of the peloton. Anouska Koster (Team Jumbo-Visma) and Marta Bastianelli (Alé BTC Ljubljana) as well as Liv Racing’s Soraya Paladin were chasing in between, but they were all reeled in by the peloton on the lower slopes of the climb.

As the group of favourites was slowly but surely closing in, Moolman Pasio then accelerated away from the Italian champion on one of the steeper parts of the climb with about eight kilometres to go. Riding alone, the 35-year-old South African climber gained time again on the favourites’ group where rider after rider dropped off.

Longo Borghini was caught and passed by Van der Breggen, Vollering, Cavalli, and Deignan about 3.5km from the finish, but Moolman Pasio held on to the top of the climb to take the first Giro Donne stage win of her career.