Giro Donne 2023 Stage 5 LIVE - Annemiek van Vleuten favourite to take the Cima Coppi on the Queen Stage

1 Antonia Niedermaier 3'14'02
2 Annemiek van Vleuten +0'09
3 Niamh Fisher Black +1'26
4 Juliette Labous ''
5 Veronica Ewers ''

Heck of a result from the American which, given Longo Borghini crashed, should actually see Ewers improve her position.

NIEDERMAIER: TIL THE END I DIDN'T KNOW IF I COULD DO IT

"I'm overwhelmed because it's my first Giro Donne. I kind of realise it now, and I'm really happy about it. I was just pushing and trying to attack and 'til the end I didn't know if I could do it. At the finish line I realised I did it, and it was a great feeling."

So that's absolutely her challenge over, but the good news is she seems to be walking wounded and chatting with her team-mate. Blood from a cut on her face, at least she lives to race another day.

Annemiek van Vleuten has to settle for second place and makes a beeline to congratulate the winner. A minute or so later the next group on the road rounds the right hander in Ceres and it's Niamh Fisher-Black who takes third place. We await word of Elisa Longo-Borghini, whether the's climbed off or continued.

Van Vleuten just put in an out-of-the-saddle acceleration and she can see the German down the road, but the rider out front is battling and refusing to concede. A final switchback allows her to look back at the maglia rosa and out she gets from the saddle. It's all or nothing.

The uphill finish is going to be to Van Vleuten's advantage, who is riding reasonably smoothly considering what's just happened, but the adrenaline must be pumping through her. The gap is about 10 seconds now.

7KM TO GO: BAD CRASHES FOR BOTH VAN VLEUTEN AND LONGO BORGHINI!

Separate incidents, it seemed and the maglia rosa's was more of a misjudgement from which she seems to have been able to recover in some way. Longo Borghini is also back on her bike - which may be a very bad idea - but replay showed her locking up as she went too fast into a left hand hairpin, going up and over a bank of earth, but not too far down a hill. Could have been much worse, but a heavy impact and she must be very shaken by that. It's definitely stage over for her in a racing sense.

9.5KM TO GO: VAN VLEUTEN ATTACKS OVER THE TOP OF THE CLIMB

She did so well to stay in touch, and more, with Van Vleuten on the steep slopes, but is she paying for it now? Maybe Van Vleuten felt she needed to do something to get ahead of the Longo Borghini, knowing the Italian is the superior descender. Can she close the gap?

Meanwhile, Antonia Niedermaier is still fending them off.

Showing why they're head and shoulders above the rest in this race. It's not possible for the Italian to crack the World Champion but she's doing her best to put the veteran star under pressure. These two have a gap of ten seconds or more, and Niedermaier's lead, which is still pretty sizeable, could come down very quickly when the road ramps up.

And the climb isn't even at the hardest part yet, but it's no surprise to see the large group fragmenting. We see a replay of one of the Canyon Sram staff sticking some ice down Antonia Niedermaier's back. It's hot out there today.

This could now be called a super group, as it means that Annemiek van Vleuten as a team-mate in Andrea Patino, Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig is back up there too, while Shirin van Anrooij could be of some support for Elisa Longo-Borghini. Could the Danish rider be bumping her way back on the podium?

Niedermaier has made excellent progress onto this Sant'Ignazio climb, and she has a buffer of well over a minute now.

RESULTS OF THE QOM

Antonia Niedermaier 6 points
Niamh Fisher-Black 5
Erica Magnaldi 4
Annemiek van Vleuten 3
Gaia Realini 1

Which doesn't change much, except for cementing AVV's spot at the top of the standings. Van Vleuten is surely just waiting for the final climb, the Sant'Ignazio, which gets seriously steep towards the top.

This isn't half an effort, this is a whole one. The Canyon-Sram rider isn't much of a threat, but she'd love to take the stage and is descending along these rickety roads like a demon.

As the road flattens out, but before the official summit, on her favoured terrain the Italian takes the opportunity. Juliette Labous, who has looked lively for some time, is the rider most interested and other are coming from behind as well. Antonia Niedermaier and Niamh Fisher-Black want some points too but it's the German rider who has gone clear.

Fisher-Black does well to maintain missile lock, while Elisa Longo Borghini digs in and claws her way back. The slopes aren't super steep at this point, but hard enough - and the legs will be less for what's come before - that it doesn't take too much to stretch the group out. No-one's been binned completely, but how many punches can they absorb?

Not only is theirs the only team with meaningful, helpful numbers, but Elisa Longo-Borghini's stage victory will have given her confidence. She's well within range of Annemiek van Vleuten on the GC, and the maglia rosa is isolated in this group. Between ELB and Gaia Realini, there's surely something they can do? They surely have to at least try.

Just testing her own legs? Or those around her. It's not a full bore effort, and Niamh Fisher-Black is alert to it.

Right ahead of the second of the day's climbs. Vietti is officially 12.6km, but only averages 3.5%, apparently, which makes it one for the power riders. Maybe even one for the Lidl-Trek pair to try something?