Dwars door Vlaanderen: Annemiek van Vleuten wins from two-up break

Annemiek van Vleuten took her first win for Team Movistar at Dwars door Vlaanderen on Wednesday.

The Dutchwoman had gone clear with Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM) at around 33 kilometers to go before the duo worked together to hold off a charging chase group. Van Vleuten opened up the final kick at 300 meters to go and was too strong for Niewiadoma to come around, who was left to take second place.

“I thought that the climb was the best place to make a difference. Fortunately not 105 kilometers from the finish — but 33 — so that is not too bad,” Van Vleuten offered. “Fortunately, Kasia Niewiadoma went with us and wanted to ride along. It was a really good race.”

https://twitter.com/DwarsdrVlaander/status/1377237384224456708

Alexis Ryan (Canyon-SRAM) won the bunch sprint for third.

Van Vleuten had opened up the race with around an hour to go, bridging across to breakaway teammate Leah Thomas. Niewiadoma countered and held van Vleuten’s move, and the duo was never seen again.

“The race was really hard. From the beginning, it was super fast. There were so many girls in the peloton and it was very difficult to move up,” commented Niewiadoma. “Maybe 40ks to go Annemiek attacked and I managed to stay on her wheel, and we stayed away in the breakaway until the finish line. I’m really destroyed now. Alexis got third and I’m super happy for her.”

Trek-Segafredo did most of the pulling in a strong chase group behind, working for defending champ Ellen van Dijk. However, with SD Worx and Liv Racing sitting in, the American squad was unable to bring back the lead pair’s advantage, which dangled around 20-30 seconds through the final 30km.

Team BikeExchange began to help with the pursuit, however a puncture for Grace Brown saw the air go out of both the Aussie’s tires and the efforts of the chase.

Van Dijk attempted several attacks out of the peloton in an attempt to bridge across to the leaders, only for Thomas to mark her out and play anchor for her teammate van Vleuten.

Van Vleuten and Niewiadoma combined well to hold off the pursuit, and went into the final straight with a 15-second lead. Van Vleuten sprinted from the front, gained a small gap on her Polish rival, and ripped to the line in a 300m out-of-the-saddle sprint to score a key win ahead of the Tour of Flanders this weekend.

🇧🇪 #DDVwomen: There she goes – huge attack by @AvVleuten with 36km to go! 🚀

A big gap for the European champion from the Movistar Team alongside Kasia Niewiadoma (CSR). ¡Vamos! 💪 #RodamosJuntos pic.twitter.com/uBf894eEkr

— Movistar Team (@Movistar_Team) March 31, 2021

“[I’m] happy for this first victory and for being able to reward the team with a victory after the good work they have been doing since the beginning of the season. Races like today and the ones we have seen these weeks give me a lot of confidence in the strength that we can have together,” said van Vleuten. “The whole team has worked 100 percent.”

Annemiek added, “For now, it’s time to enjoy this triumph, rest for a few days, and settle down after concentrating on altitude and then thinking about Sunday.”