Katrine Aalerud (Movistar) claimed the first overall victory of her career at the Vuelta Andalucia Women in Castellar de la Frontera on Sunday.
The Norwegian rider was part of a three-rider breakaway which escaped the peloton with 60 kilometres to go using the ramp of the only climb of the day on the fifth and final stage.
In the final sprint, Mie Bjørndal Ottestad (Norway) won the stage ahead of Aalerud. Lotte Claes (Stade Rochelais Charente Maritime) took third.
Second in the general classification at the start of the day, Aalerud overcame the 47 seconds deficit to Tamara Dronova-Balabolina (Israel Premier Tech Roland) to win the overall.
"I'm so happy with this, my first GC victory. I wanted to give it a fight and see if we could get closer to Dronova, but I was also afraid that an attack over the Cat-1 ascent would not stick because it was so far away from the finish. However, it was better to try than leaving without having at least made an attempt. And we achieved it - which I'm so, so happy about,” Aalerud said.
"Dronova is an explosive rider who does way better at shorter ascents like the previous days', but at the flatter section, with the three of us taking turns, and the good cooperation until the end, gave us a decisive margin to win. I think we managed ourselves well as a team over the week, and this is a huge reward for the excellent job everyone did here in Andalucía, both riders and staff.”
Finishing with the chasing peloton, Dronova-Balabolina crossed the line 1:04 after the winner and dropped to third place in the final general classification. Ottestad claimed second place five seconds behind Aalerud.
Starting from Estepona, the peloton cracked as they climbed the category 1 climb, Puerto Hacho de Gaucín, 11 kilometres into the 95.6km stage. Aalerud, Ottestad and Claes attacked out of the reduced field while Dronova-Balabolina could not follow their wheels.
With 42 kilometres to go, the trio maintained a lead of 50 seconds from the chasers. They increased their gap to slightly over one minute in the final 10 kilometres.
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