Hosking wins stage 1 of the Women's Tour Down Under

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Chloe Hosking (Rally Cycling) leapt from behind Trek-Segafredo’s Lotta Henttala with force to produce an emphatic sprint victory at the first stage of Australia’s Women’s Tour Down Under. Henttala (née Lepistö) held on for second while powerful local rider Matilda Raynolds (Specialized Women’s Racing) clinched third.

Thanks to her victory, Hosking is the first race leader and will wear the ochre-coloured leader's jersey on stage 2 on Friday.

It was the newly crowned Australian criterium champion’s fourth stage win at the Santos Women’s Tour Down Under, but the 116-kilometre Ziptrak stage 1 was the first time Hosking had taken a victory alongside her new team Rally Cycling.

"I'm super stoked. It means a lot that the team has come over here to support me, and the girls were incredible today, so I'm really pleased that I can already give them back a UCI win," said Hosking after the stage.

"We were committed to the sprint for me and I just asked the girls to keep me out of trouble leading into the last 15 kilometres and get me into this quite technical section with one-and-a-half kilometres to go at the front. I knew I was going to use them early so then I just said I’d jump trains and that’s exactly what we did," said Hosking.

There was plenty of competition for victory at the first international UCI women's race on the 2020 calendar. The field for the four-stage UCI ProSeries race was packed with in-form Australian riders straight from their National Road Championships and six of the eight Women’s WorldTour teams. For a while it looked like the chance of a win could even be riding away from the sprinters, with an audacious breakaway by Brodie Chapman (FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope) caught just before the final corners.

How it happened

The riders rolled out from Hahndorf in the Adelaide hills, facing the 1,551 metres of climbing in uncharacteristically mild January weather. The peloton was together for the first sprint, just eight kilometres into the race, but after Gracie Elvin (Mitchelton-Scott) wound it up to roll over the line first, Marieke van Witzenburg (Doltcini-Van Eyck) went on the attack.

The Dutch rider then settled in for a 40-kilometre solo ride, reaching the Knotts Hill Queen of the Mountain, still out the front. The Doltcini-Van Eyck rider was swallowed up by the peloton soon after, but those Queen of the Mountain points that she’d already swept up were enough to put her in the climbers jersey at the end of Stage 1.

The peloton didn’t stay together for too long though, with Anastasiia Chursina (Ale BTC Ljubljana), Jenelle Crooks (Team-TIBCO Silicon Valley Bank) and Silvia Valsecchi (BePink) establishing a small gap. Team Sunweb closed it down before the second sprint at 70 kilometres, which was won by the team’s Canadian rider, Leah Kirchmann.

With 76 kilometres covered, and 40 kilometres to go, the Doltcini-Van Eyck Sport team were again on the attack, with Nicole Hanselmann out the front this time. She was quickly joined by Australian rider Brodie Chapman (FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope), who has shown she can be a dangerous rider to let get away, especially with a technical run into the finish.

Still the peloton initially wasn't keen to work together to chase the break. After Chapman went alone the lead had stretched out to 2 minutes and 45 seconds, with only 20 kilometres to go. Then the peloton clearly upped the pace and the chase began.

The former downhill mountain biker was still well out the front at the third sprint, 15 kilometres from the finish, but the gap quickly tumbled until she was in sight of the peloton at the five kilometres to go mark. Not one to surrender easily, Chapman was only caught before the final corners of the technical run into the finish line.

The peloton was strung out during the final stretch and Hosking had the perfect position. She jumped out from behind Henttala with an unmatchable acceleration and added yet another victory to a stellar start to 2020. 

Hosking also took the sprint jersey and gained a four-second lead on Henttala, her nearest rival in the overall. The bulk of the field, including defending champion and three-time tour winner Amanda Spratt, are 11 seconds behind Hosking in the general classification, after Hosking also opened a one-second gap in the sprint.

That means that with two more road stages ahead and then Sunday’s final criterium, the battle for the overall victory at the fifth UCI ranked edition of the Women’s Tour Down Under is still wide open. There is more climbing in the next two road stages which leaves plenty of opportunity for the field to split or a break to get away.

Juliette Labous (Team Sunweb) will wear the young riders jersey on the next stage while the Queen of the Mountain leader Van Witzenburg also took out the most aggressive rider competition and Team Sunweb took the teams classification lead.

Results

General classification