Women’s Tour stage 6: Lorena Wiebes makes it three, Elisa Longo Borghini pounces on GC victory

Lorena Wiebes (Team DSM) completed a hat trick of victories on the final stage of the Women’s Tour.

The Dutch supersprinter beat Clara Copponi (FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope) to the line to take a phenomenal 11th season-victory in downtown Oxford.

Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek Segafredo) was near the front all through the hectic final kilometer and looked to be working as leadout for teammate Chloe Hosking. However the Italian rouleur took the initiative and threw her bike at the line to finish third and score the four bonus seconds needed for the GC victory.

Longo Borghini’s move vaulted her above Katarzyna Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM Racing) and overnight leader Grace Brown (FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope), who started the day level on time, two seconds ahead of the Trek-Segafredo star.

Brown even extended her lead during the race, taking three seconds at the first intermediate sprint of the day. Longo Borghini finished fourth in the sprint, with Brown effectively moving into a three second lead. It looked as though the overall standings would remain with Brown on top, even after she had a late mechanical as the race went through Abingdon with 15km to go.

A late break was reeled in with just under 5km to go before the final technical sections through the centre of Oxford. Team DSM had been on the front for most of the second half of the stage and they duly set up Wiebes for the win. However the GC drama was far from over, with Borghini positioning herself perfectly through the final set of corners before catapulting herself to third on the line.

Even FDJ Nouvelle riders thought that Brown had won after they crossed the line, only for the news of her time loss to ripple through the peloton.

“I took the first intermediate sprint that put me three seconds ahead. We thought that we were pretty safe for the final as long as there were no gaps but it was really messy and Trek did an amazing leadout to put Elisa in a really good position ahead of the corners. That had her there to sprint for third, which we really didn’t expect. I don’t know where I placed, maybe a little bit behind but chapeau to her for an amazing sprint finish,” Brown said.