Lizzie Armitstead wins Strade Bianche Women

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Boels Dolmans remains the team to beat in the early season as world champion Lizzie Armitstead scored the squad’s fourth road win of the year at UCI Women’s WorldTour opener Strade Bianche. The Briton beat out Kasia Niewiadoma (Rabo-Liv) and Emma Johansson (Wiggle-High5) to the top step of the podium in Siena’s Piazza del Campo on Saturday. The trio broke away from a reduced peloton following the fifth of seven gravel sectors.

“It wasn’t really the plan,” said Armitstead, who insisted in a pre-race conference on Friday that while the race was a team target, it was not a personal objective. “My legs are better than I expected. Training has been going good but not really this good. I’m excited that my legs are already like this because I think there’s still room to improve.”

Armitstead is now batting two-for-two in the rainbow jersey, and, as she pointed out to Cyclingnews post-race, she’s won her last four races – GP Plouay, which earned her the World Cup overall, and the World Championships to close out the 2015 season. She can now count wins at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Strade Bianche to open the season.

Her victory in Siena came with the honour of donning the first Women’s WorldTour jersey, making her the last women to wear the (now defunct) World Cup series jersey, and the first women to wear the Women’s WorldTour jersey.

“We’ve already started the season really well,” Armitstead said. “The Hour Record was fantastic. Already, three victories in Europe and one in Qatar; it’s difficult to improve on that. The hardest thing is to be on the top all the time. It doesn’t come easy. We make it look easy but it’s not. Our biggest challenge is staying on the top.”

Nikki Harris, Armitstead’s teammate, launched an attack in the third gravel sector that would serve to split the peloton and set the stage for the action still to come. The British cyclocross champion is racing her first road season with Boels-Dolmans and has clearly carried her form from the mud to the road (and gravel).

“No one really took it on when we got to the third gravel section,” said Armitstead. “I said to Nikki: ‘You have to attack.’ I wanted to break apart the race because we need an aggressive race for the team to perform well. Nikki attacked, and she got away solo.”

Harris’ escape sparked a reaction. With 40-kilometres left to race, Harris had 30-seconds over Lucinda Brand (Rabo-Liv) and another 23-seconds over a chase group of eight. The steep climbs, winding descents and blustery wind were taking their toll on the bunch.

“I had hoped someone would go with Nikki when I told her to attack,” Armitstead noted. “Lucinda eventually caught her. Each gravel section, it was an elimination race, and only the strongest survived.”

The lead group swelled to 40 riders with 30 kilometres left to race.

“People kept coming back to the group, but the front of the race was the same,” said Armitstead. “It was always the same riders working.”

Rabo-Liv deployed a one-two punch with Anna van der Breggen and Niewiadoma. Van der Breggen was the first to attack, and Niewiadoma countered the catch in what would prove to be the decisive move of the race.

“I went with both attacks,” said Armitstead. “The move with Kasia stuck, and Emma made it across to us. She just sat on because she was saying it was for [teammate] Elisa [Longo Borghini] behind.”

“Kasia worked really hard, and I worked really hard,” Armitstead continued. “It was good in the final that Emma didn’t win. I was a little concerned about how fresh she was going to be.”

The leading trio exited the seventh and final sector of gravel with a 58-second advantage and extend that gap out to nearly two minutes on the run-in to Siena. Armitstead kept a close watch on Niewiadoma, who she considered the biggest threat.

“I knew that Kasia’s best option was to attack me on the final climb,” said Armitstead. “I knew she would go early, and I knew when she did, it was going to be hard for me to hold her wheel. I was so focused on her attack.”

Although Niewiadoma picked up the pace up the climb, it wasn’t enough to dislodge Armitstead.

“I stayed on her wheel until 100 metres before the archway,” Armitstead explained. “That’s when I attacked, and I stayed away.”

“I’m really proud,” she added. “I’m really proud of the team. We’re one of the strongest teams, and I think we showed that today, and we showed it on the best stage. The Women’s WorldTour is hopefully going to be a better stage for women’s cycling, and we showed again that we can perform on the biggest stages.”

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