Supreme Lotte Kopecky sprints to brilliant Strade Bianche Donne victory ahead of Annemiek van Vleuten

A stunning ride from Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx) saw the Belgian sprint to a brilliant Strade Bianche Donne victory ahead of Annemiek van Vleuten.

It all came down to a dramatic finale in front of plenty of passionate fans, and it was Kopecky who had just enough in the tank to take the triumph after 136km of tough racing.

The 26-year-old was pushed to the absolute limit by Van Vleuten, who looked as though she could grab victory herself in trademark fashion, but came up agonisingly short.

"This is super nice to do, I had team mates behind me who had my back. I think today was perfect, I cannot believe this,” said Kopecky afterwards.

"I don’t know what happened in my head, I just kept going. I passed her, she passed me again and it’s just amazing to win this race.”

Before the race had even begun, BikeExchange's Kristen Faulkner and Ane Santesteban pulled out, failing to recover from a crash yesterday whilst on a recce ride. But the rest set off in perfect conditions, sunny without a cloud in the sky and no sign of any rain.

The first riders to make a move off the front were Emily Newsom (EF Education-TIBCO-SVB) and Rebecca Koener (Uno X), with the peloton happy to let them go in the early stages. Koener couldn’t hold Newsom’s wheel though through the second climb of the day and soon found herself back in the bunch. The American was left out front by herself for over 60km, before the fifth gravel section of San Martino in Grania proved too challenging alone, seeing her lead cut from over three minutes to just 35 seconds.

The peloton used the slight descent to pounce, swallowing the American before the pace started to increase with 50km to go. That was the moment the echelons came into play, briefly disrupting the peloton’s plans and almost wrecking havoc with the field. But no one was able to make a decisive move, and with 45km to go, it was all back together as the pack headed towards the sixth gravel section on these famous white roads.

It took until the final 22km for another move to stick, as the peloton was whittled down dramatically in a short, sharp 800m of steep gravel. Kopecky used the following climb as a springboard to launch an attack, catching her rivals napping while they were concentrating on the change in terrain.

The Belgian made it to the next section of gravel with a 17 second lead, but she couldn’t hold on as the dust kicked up, although her brief break splintered the peloton, leaving just six riders up front including pre-race favourite Van Vleuten and Marianne Vos. Elisa Longo Borghini and defending champion Chantel van den Broek-Blaak were left adrift, but kicked on to bridge back and get themselves into contention with just 16km to go.

Van den Broek-Blaak then gave it a go herself, trying to force the pace and make a move stick just before the final gravel section. But having already chased back once, she just didn’t have enough life left in her legs and was both caught and spat back out of the leading group in quick succession, her title defence over.

Pre-race favourite Van Vleuten launched her attack in that section, and it looked a decisive move with only Kopecky able to stick to her wheel. Those two raced clear, the Belgian sensibly not sharing the work as they approached the final climb. Behind, Marianne Vos couldn’t co-ordinate the chase – she decided to go for the riskier tactic of gambling that the break would come back, conserving energy accordingly.

And it proved the correct tactic, as Van Vleuten didn’t have the legs to break free of Kopecky, and was unwilling to drag the Belgian along. Those two came back to the chasing pack with 8km to go – and it looked like after four hours of hard racing, it was all coming down to the final climb.

And indeed it did, with nine riders hitting the final kilometre together. Van Vleuten started to churn through the gears, going for a relatively lengthy charge for the line and once again, she found herself clear with just Kopecky on her wheel. Out of the saddle, the Movistar rider was giving this one everything she had – but she couldn’t shake her obdurate rival.

The Belgian pulled out of the Dutch woman’s slipstream with 200m to go, but van Vleuten wasn’t easily conquered and the two women were side by side into the final corner. But Kopecky had studied the finish, admitting to re-watching both last year’s race and the men’s edition, and knew she wanted the inside line. She swept through to take the biggest victory of her career at just 26 years of age, roaring with triumph as she crossed the line.

Van Vleuten came home second, ahead of Kopecky’s team mate Ashleigh Moolman Pasio, who was third. A thrilling race to open the women’s WorldTour proper, Strade Bianche certainly delivered today in what is looking like being an incredibly competitive season on the women’s tour.

The women will be in action once again at Miron Ronde van Drenthe next weekend.

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