September 24/20 14:33 pm - van der Breggen Takes World TT Title as Dygert Suffers Serious Crash
Posted by Editoress on 09/24/20
Anna van der Breggen took the first world title for the Netherlands at these compressed Road World Championships on Thursday in the women's time trial. Marlen Reusser of Germany took silver and Ellen van Dijk of the Netherlands the bronze medal. It was van der Breggen's first time trial world title after four silver medals.
Anna van der Breggen
Marlen Reusser, Anna vander Breggen, Ellen van Dijk,
However, the awards ceremony was overshadowed by the crash and serious injury to defending world champion Chloe Dygert of the United States. Dygert was solidly in the lead by nearly half a minute when she crashed at high speed in an S-bend descent, hitting the metal barrier and sliding along it before tumbling down a ten metre embankment to end up under a tree. She could be seen trying to keep control as the wheels skipped across the road. She gashed her leg on the barrier and was transported to hospital by helicopter; she was conscious and talking, and appears to have suffered no head trauma. We are still waiting for word on her condition.
Chloe Dygert
The 31.7 kilometre circuit took riders down one side of a valley and back on the other, starting and finishing on the Enzo et Dino Ferrari Autodrome track. Riders faced strong headwinds on the way out, before being pushed home. The second half included a number of short, steep climbs and descents on narrow, twisty roads.
Emma Jorgensen of Denmark set the early fast time, eventually finishing seventh after being the ninth rider to start. She held the lead until Grace Brown (Australia) bumped her by just under two seconds. van Dijk, the 11th to last rider to start, finally pushed the Australian off the Hot Seat. Reusser, the third from last starter, then took the lead, but Dygert was destroying her intermediate splits. At the 14 kilometre mark, the American was 26.54 seconds ahead of Reusser, with van dr Breggen another ten seconds in arrears. The Dutch rider began overhauling Reusser in the final kilometres, but Dygert looked to be on her way to a second victory until her crash.
The two Canadians in the race - Leah Kirchmann and Karol-Ann Canuel - finished 21st and 22nd, respectively. Kirchmann was 2:34.78 behind van der Breggen's winning time of 40:20.14, with Canuel a further 11.93 seconds behind.
Leah Kirchmann
Karol-Ann Canuel
"It was a really hard day out there today," said Kirchmann. "Personally, I was hoping for a little bit more in the time trial, but it is my only time trial of this season, so it was just nce to get the opportunity to race today and test myself against the clock. Pacing was important and I think I may paced it a little bit fast to the turnaround and then lost some time on the way back. Finishing on the race track was a nice, fast way to end the day, and I tried to have some fun in the final corners."
"The race was really fast and really hard, like we expected," said Canuel. "It was a headwind on the way out; a really strong one, so my goal was to go as hard as I could and then try to use the tailwind on the way back. I think I did pretty well, but I have mixed feeling right now; I feel like my result doesn't really show how fast I went. But, I gave it all I had, and now I will focus on the road race."
Road World Championships: Women's ITT results
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