Giro d'Italia Donne: Kristen Faulkner wins stage 9 with solo attack

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Kristen Faulkner (Team BikeExchange-Jayco) won the final mountain stage of the Giro d'Italia Donne, 112.8 km over three hard climbs and with an uphill finish. The Alaskan-born 29-year-old went on the attack with Italian climber Gaia Realini (Isolmant-Premac-Vittoria) on the Fai della Paganella, the first climb of the day.

Faulkner picked up mountain points throughout the day to take the lead in the mountain classification and left Realini behind 1.5 km from the top of the steep Passo Daone, the last classified climb of the day. In the group of favourites, Marta Cavalli (FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope) had attacked, and only maglia rosa Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar Team) could follow her.

Cavalli left Van Vleuten behind on the descent but waited for her afterwards, and a group of four formed in the last 15 km as Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek-Segafredo) had come back and the three picked up Realini. 3:21 minutes behind third-placed Mavi García (UAE Team ADQ) before the stage, Longo Borghini was driving the group to take as much time on García as possible.

Faulkner continued on her own and defended her lead, winning the stage 59 seconds ahead of Cavalli who had attacked in the downhill before the finishing climb. Longo Borghini and Van Vleuten finished 1:14 minutes behind Faulkner, with Realini at 1:44 minutes.

García had pulled her group for the last 20 km to finish in ninth place, 3:42 minutes behind Faulkner, defending her third podium spot against Longo Borghini by 49 seconds.

“Last year in the Giro, I was off the back the whole time, so this year is pretty special,” said Faulkner after her second stage win, following up on the stage 1 time trial. 

“Two of our riders weren’t able to start yesterday because of COVID, so I just really wanted to put it all out there for them and for the team and give the best show,” the new mountain jersey leader added.

"Today was really hard, we knew that our best chance for a stage win was to go in an early break, so on the first climb, pretty early, less than 20km in, Gaia went and I went with her and we were able to get a gap and stay away."

How it unfolded

Faulkner and Realini attacked halfway up the second-category, 11.6-kilometre Fai della Paganella climb that started after only 11.2 km. At the top, they were 1:17 minutes ahead of a very reduced peloton of 17 riders, with three more riders chasing in between.

The two escapees increased their advantage in the downhill, and crossing the finish line with 70 km to go, they were 2:30 minutes ahead of Brodie Chapman (FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope), Anouska Koster (Team Jumbo-Visma), and Erica Magnaldi (UAE Team ADQ), with the peloton – grown to about 35 riders – at 3:20 minutes.

Lucinda Brand (Trek-Segafredo) bridged to the chase group on her own, and the race situation stayed relatively stable on the 10.1-kilometre Passo Duron where Faulkner took the lead in the mountain classification.

Faulkner and Realini got even further away on the flat part before the last classified climb and started the first-category Passo Daone with almost two minutes on the chase group and four minutes on what was left of the peloton.

The incredibly-steep average gradient of 10.9% thinned out the favourites’ group -  only Van Vleuten, García, Cavalli, Niamh Fisher-Black (Team SD Worx), Longo Borghini, Neve Bradbury (Canyon-SRAM), Silvia Persico (Valcar-Travel & Service), Juliette Labous (Team DSM), and Cavalli’s teammate Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig were left when Cavalli made her move.

Van Vleuten went with the Italian, and García tried the same but quickly had to give up. Her teammate Magnaldi dropped back from the chase group to briefly help the Spanish champion.

As Cavalli led Van Vleuten up the climb and continued to eat into the advantage of Realini who led Faulkner up the steep slopes, the US rider decided to go solo, easily leaving her Italian breakaway companion behind. Longo Borghini caught García and rode with her for some time before going on the offensive, trying to take time on the Spaniard by attacking near the end of the climb.

Faulkner reached the Passo Daone 1:52 minutes ahead of Cavalli and Van Vleuten who had taken over on the last kilometre, Realini riding on her own in between. Cavalli and Longo Borghini both threw themselves down the descent while Van Vleuten took a more cautious approach, not wanting to risk her near-certain Giro Donne victory.

When Longo Borghini caught up with Van Vleuten, Cavalli sat up to wait for them, and Longo Borghini went to the front of the group to increase her gap on García who was chasing in the next group down the road together with Magnaldi.

Longo Borghini and Cavalli attacked again on a descent before the uphill finish, opening a small gap on Van Vleuten and Realini. The maglia rosa caught Longo Borghini as the road went up again, her chase making Realini lose contact, but Cavalli continued on her own.

After negotiating the three-kilometre climb to the finish, Faulkner could celebrate her stage win and taking the green mountain jersey, also moving up into 11th place overall. Including bonus seconds, Cavalli gained 21 seconds on Van Vleuten, but still trails the 39-year-old Dutchwoman by 1:52 minutes. García limited her losses to hang on to third place overall, going into the final stage, a flat day around Padova, with a 49-second advantage on Longo Borghini.