Giro d'Italia Women: Elisa Longo Borghini confirms overall victory as Le Court wins stage 8 from breakaway

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In her 13th participation, Elisa Longo Borghini (Lidl-Trek) won the 2024 Giro d'Italia Women, leading the race overall from start to finish. Going into the final stage with a one-second lead over Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx-Protime), Longo Borghini followed Kopecky's wheel on the Acquasanta climb with 4km to go.

A break of three riders took the bonus seconds, with Kim Le Court (AG Insurance-Soudal) winning the sprint for the stage win ahead of Ruth Edwards (Human Powered Health) and Franzi Koch (DSM-Firmenich PostNL), and on the finishing straight, Longo Borghini sprinted away from Kopecky to finish fourth on the day and secure the maglia rosa.

"Now it’s mine. Today we started, and people were doubting, they were like, ‘Oh, Kopecky will outsprint you’, and I was like, ‘We have one per cent of the chances to win, we have one second'," said Longo Borghini before thanking her teammates and staff.

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"Everyone in the team was super-motivated to keep the maglia rosa, all my teammates did an amazing job and everyone was so committed, so thank you very much."

The 32-year-old is the first Italian winner of the Giro d’Italia Women since Fabiana Luperini in 2008, and the importance was not lost on her.

"I am really proud to wear this maglia rosa in Italy with the Lidl-Trek jersey on. I will need some time to realise what I’ve been doing," said Longo Borghini. 

"It was so special because my husband came this morning, he started around 2:30 tonight to be here, and I just wanted to cross the line with the maglia rosa to show everyone that I was the strongest and that Lidl-Trek is the strongest team."

How it unfolded

There were several attacks early on the stage. Asia Zontone (Isolmant-Premac-Vittoria), Loes Adegeest (FDJ-Suez), and Lieke Nooijen (Visma-Lease a Bike) succeeded in getting away and had a 35-second gap but were caught again before the intermediate sprint that was won by Silvia Zanardi (Human Powered Health), securing her victory in that classification.

On the third-category Forca di Penne climb, Lucinda Brand (Lidl-Trek), Claire Steels (Movistar), and Katrine Aalerud (Uno-X Mobility) went away. Justine Ghekiere (AG Insurance-Soudal) bridged to them before the top and took maximum points for her blue mountain jersey.

The four escapees’ advantage on what remained of the peloton never went above 30 seconds as Niamh Fisher-Black (SD Worx-Protime) worked hard to bring them back on the first-category Castel del Monte climb. Ghekiere was first over the top again, securing the mountain jersey, but the break was quickly caught on the descent.

A move by Brodie Chapman (Lidl-Trek) was closed down by Kopecky herself, then Edwards attacked with Juliette Labous (DSM-Firmenich PostNL). This move was reeled in by Pauliena Rooijakkers (Fenix-Deceuninck) and Neve Bradbury (Canyon-SRAM) protecting their GC placings, before Le Court tried unsuccessfully to get away.

Edwards and Koch got a gap on the descent, and when Le Court bridged across with 36.5km to go, the day's decisive breakaway was formed. Fisher-Black was the only rider chasing for Kopecky in a pelotonthat was down to just 20 riders, and the gap gradually increased to 1:15 minutes.

After an unsuccessful attempt by Grace Brown (FDJ-Suez), Adegeest went on the chase and had closed to within 25 seconds of the front trio at the bottom of the unclassified Acquasanta climb with just under 5km to go, the favourites’ group being 1:20 minutes behind.

Mavi García (Liv-AlUla-Jayco) went hard on the climb, eventually reaching the faltering Adegeest, and Magdeleine Vallières Mill (EF-Oatly-Cannondale) tried to follow the Spaniard but was herself passed by Kopecky who had Longo Borghini and Bradbury on her wheel.

Further up the road, Koch was dropped by Edwards and Le Court, and the German champion started the descent about ten seconds behind. The group led by Kopecky was 45 seconds down, having caught García and Adegeest. Koch managed to come back to the front with 1.8km to go, and the three frontrunners started playing cat-and-mouse before entering the finishing climb ahead of the flamme rouge.

Attacks from Dominika Włodarczyk (UAE Team ADQ), Adegeest, Vallières Mill, and Mareille Meijering (Movistar Team) kept the pace high in the chase group, and García bridged to Vallières Mill and Meijering just after the flamme rouge. Bradbury launched herself from the chase group on the finishing climb, prompting Kopecky to react with Longo Borghini on her wheel.

As Le Court sprinted past Edwards to win her first professional victory, Meijering, García, and Vallières Mill were caught again by Bradbury, Kopecky, and Longo Borghini – and the maglia rosa mobilised her last reserves to make another acceleration, sprinting away to claim fourth place. Kopecky saw that she was beaten and stopped pushing, dropping back and losing 20 seconds on the last metres.

Because of this, the final overall classification has Longo Borghini 21 seconds ahead of Kopecky – who wins the red points jersey and takes the lead in the Women’s WorldTour ranking – and 1:16 minutes ahead of Bradbury, winner of the white jersey as the best U23 rider as well as the combativity prize. Liv-AlUla-Jayco won the team classification.

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