Setmana Valenciana: Elisa Balsamo sprints to stage 1 victory

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Elisa Balsamo (Lidl-Trek) sprinted to the win on her first race day of the 2024 season, beating Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease A Bike) and Noemi Rüegg (EF Education-Cannondale) to the line on the opening stage of the Setmana Ciclista Volta Femenina de la Comunitat Valenciana.

The sprint was set up late on in the 113km stage between Tavernes de la Valldigna and Gandia, with Victoire Berteau (Cofidis) caught inside the final kilometre after going solo over the last climb of the day, 17km out.

Balsamo went long in the dash for the line, with Vos, who was racing for the first time since iliac artery surgery last August, coming up fast. However, the Dutchwoman – along with new EF signing Rüegg – couldn't make up the ground to the Italian.

As a result, Balsamo now leads the GC by four seconds heading into the second of four stages, with Rüegg lying six seconds down.

Anneke Dijkstra (VolkerWessels) lies in fourth at seven seconds after making it into the second of the day's two breakaways. She went clear along with Berteau with 60km to go after Marjolein van't Geloof (Hess Cycling) and Laura Molenaar (VolkerWessels) were brought back early by the peloton.

Daniela Campos (Eneicat-CMTeam) also attempted to make the move, but couldn't get across to the duo and so had to drop back to the peloton. The two leaders hit the final 30km with a four-minute advantage having picked up a handful of bonus seconds at the day's intermediate sprint (Berteau lies fifth overall at eight seconds).

The breakaway pair still had the two final climbs of the stage – the Alto de Barxeta (2km at 5%) and Alto de Barx (6km at 4.8%) – to contend with, however.

Lidl-Trek pushed the pace on the second of the two as up front the French champion Berteau left Dijkstra behind in a bid for glory. The Dutch rider was soon taken back by the peloton, which also saw Visma-Lease A Bike and SD Worx share pacemaking duties.

The massed power at the head of the peloton was, eventually, too much for Berteau, who managed to stick it out in the sole lead of the stage until just after the final kilometre of the 113. That set up the final sprint, where Lidl-Trek's hard work was duly rewarded by their leader, who scored the 23rd victory of her career.

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