August 17/18 15:55 pm - Ladies Tour of Norway: Stage 1 results

Posted by Editoress on 08/17/18
 

Last years winner and three times World Champion Marianne Vos (Waowdeals Pro Cycling Team) won both the stage and took the overall lead in the Ladies Tour of Norway on the 1st stage after 127.7 km run between Rakkestad and Mysen. It was a close call for lone breakaway-rider Karol-Ann Canuel (Boels Dolmans Cyclingteam) who came close to holding off the chasers bearing down on her as she drew close to the line.

"Last year I didn’t make any good result here. I was to far behind into the uphill finish. But I learned something from that and now I was in a better position, even though it was very unsure if we should catch Karol-Ann", said Vos who just managed to edge out the Swedish champion Emilia Fahlin by a few centimeters.

A lot of wind and a lot of hills caused many splits in the peloton during the first part of the stage, but then 33 riders got a gap between Spydeberg and Askim and Canuel attacked before the final two laps and eventually a gap of over 1 minute.

Floortje Mackaij (Team Sunweb) tried to get up to her, but she couldn’t quite make it. Instead it was Mitchelton-Scott with Annemiek van Vleuten and Amanda Spratt who worked to reel in Canuel then set up Grace Elvin in the sprint.

But when the riders arrived at the uphill finish, Marianne Vos had placed herself in a perfect position. With the victory on the stage and after taking both of the intermediate sprints the reining champion has taken a grip on the race even with two stages left.

Katarzyna Niewiadoma (Canyon//SRAM Racing) has the KoM jersey, while Italian Chiara Consonni (Valcar PBM) takes the lead in the best young rider competition. Susanne Andersen (Hitec Products-Birk Sport) was the best Norwegian.

Results