Charlotte Kool (Team DSM-Firmenich) won the prologue of the 2023 Simac Ladies Tour, covering the 2.4 kilometres through Ede in 3:04 minutes. The sprinter beat the time set by Dutch ITT champion Riejanne Markus (Team Jumbo-Visma) by four seconds, and the last starter, Lotte Kopecky (Team SD Worx), also came short of Kool's time, finishing just behind Markus in third place.
“This was a goal of mine, and it’s great that I could win it. I think this is one of the strongest fields you can have for a prologue, so to win it is special,” said Kool after the stage.
“We put a special focus on this sort of prologue, and that paid off today. I have trained hard for it, and the team prepared everything well. You have to be able to do the parcours in your sleep and race it on autopilot. I did a lot of training on the TT bike. I raced the course two years ago, so I still had that in my head, and I did it several times before the race today, and that resulted in the first place,” Kool continued before receiving the stage winner’s trophy and the yellow jersey of the first GC leader.
How it unfolded
The prologue course was the same as in 2021, including the Paasberg hill halfway through, followed by a somewhat technical, slightly downhill section through a residential area before finishing on a main road.
The second starter, Lieke Nooijen (Parkhotel Valkenburg), set the first benchmark of 3:16 minutes but was quickly bested by Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar Team), who had opted for an early start time and stopped the clock after 3:13 minutes.
Barbara Guarischi (Team SD Worx) came very close to Van Vleuten’s time but was 0.37 seconds from taking the lead. Elisa Balsamo (Lidl-Trek), however, went into the hot seat with 3:12 minutes and stayed there for some time until Markus took a whole four seconds off Balsamo’s time, showing that the explosive course suited both ITT specialists and sprinters.
Although Team SD Worx’ Demi Vollering and Lorena Wiebes came close with 3:10 and 3:09 minutes, respectively, Markus kept the lead until the last eight starters. Kool flew around the course, improving on her 2021 time by five seconds and finishing four seconds faster than Markus to take the lead.
Kopecky was the last rider on the course but could not beat Kool’s time, finishing in third place 0.32 seconds behind Markus.
Results
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