Mylène de Zoete (Ceratizit-WNT) won stage 1 of the Tour of Chongming Island, beating Georgia Baker (Jayco AlUla) and Daria Pikulik (Human Powered Health) to the line in the bunch sprint, admitting she was supposed to lead out her teammate Martina Fidenza but the finish line came surprisingly early.
The break of the day only got away halfway through the 108.9-kilometre stage and the three riders held a lead of up to two minutes, with two chasers bridging 29 km from the finish.
By that time, however, the peloton was controlling the gap and the breakaway was caught with 19km to go. There were no further attacks, and on a wide road, De Zoete had the best positioning and highest speed to win the stage.
With time bonifications, De Zoete now leads the general classification by four seconds to Pikulik and six seconds to Baker.
"I was supposed to be the lead out but then I had to brake and get going again and the line was suddenly there," she explained.
"It's difficult to time a lead out but both Martina and I like the speed as track riders, and so it went well in the end. We were a bit confused at the first, because the line was already there but Martina was happy for me, so all is good. We're happy as a team."
"It's exciting to lead the race and lets see if we can do it again and win a WorldTour stage race. First we take it day by day. We'll enjoy being in the leader's jersey."
How it unfolded
The 2023 edition of the Tour of Chongming Island is the first since 2019 as the race was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic in the last three years.
Held on the flat island of Chongming in the Yangtze estuary, just north of Shanghai, the highest point of the first stage was a bridge just six metres above sea level, serving as the day’s only ‘mountain’ sprint after 16.3 km.
There were no attacks until then, and Nina Kessler (Jayco AlUla) was first on the bridge, taking the lead in the QOM classification.
After several short-lived solo attacks, Thi That Nguyen (Israel-Premier Tech Roland), Georgia Whitehouse (ARA-Skip Capital), and Jarmila Machačová (Dukla Praha) got a 22-second gap, but they were brought back again by UAE Team ADQ who targeted the intermediate sprints.
Their sprinter Chiara Consonni duly won the first intermediate sprint and took three bonus seconds ahead of Vittoria Guazzini (FDJ-SUEZ) and Hanna Tserakh (Li Ning Star Ladies).
Nicole Hartychová (Dukla Praha) then attacked with 54 km to go, and when Tiril Jørgensen (Team Coop-Hitec Products) and Talsa Naskovich (Li Ning Star Ladies) bridged to her, the break of the day had formed.
The three riders were just over a minute ahead when Tang Xin (Chinese national team) and Lu Siying (China-Liv) went clear of the peloton to chase. The breakaway’s advantage topped out at 1:52 minutes with 36 km to go. When Tang and Lu bridged to the three frontrunners, the peloton had taken up the chase and was 1:14 minutes behind.
Tan won the second intermediate sprint ahead of Naskovich and Jørgensen, but the sprinters’ teams were now chasing in earnest, and 22 km from the finish, the gap was down to 35 seconds. Jørgensen attacked in a last attempt to keep the breakaway going, but all five escapees were reeled in with 19 km to go.
The pace stayed high in the final, preventing any last-minute attacks, and Jayco-AlUla brought Baker to the front into the final turn on the last kilometre. Marta Lach (Ceratizit-WNT) took the front with De Zoete on her wheel, and when Baker launched her sprint, De Zoete could go directly into her slipstream and come around in the final metres to win. Pikulik came up close to the barriers on the right-hand side of the road and just beat Baker for second place.
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