Marianne Vos: 32 remarkable stage victories at the Giro d'Italia Donne - Gallery

Marianne Vos (Jumbo-Visma) wins stage 6 of the 2022 Giro d'Italia Donne (Image credit: Getty Images Sport)

While sports fans watch and wait in anticipation to see if Mark Cavendish will surpass Eddy Merckx’s record 35 stage wins at the Tour de France, over the border in Italy, another cycling icon, Marianne Vos, is chasing a remarkable 33rd career stage victory at the Giro d’Italia Donne.

Vos is racing her 18th season in the professional peloton and has been one of the best riders in the world for close to two decades, with 13 world championship titles across three disciplines - road, cyclo-cross and track - along with two gold medals in road and track racing at the Olympic Games.

Vos took a nearly two-year hiatus from the sport citing burnout and injury, and after a three-year absence from the GIro d’Itaila Donne, she returned in 2018 under the Waowdeals banner and won stage 8 into Breganze. Vos, the European Champion at the time, was part of a breakaway that got away in the technical descent after the final climb of the day and reached the finish line where she outsprinted Elisa Longo Borghini (Wiggle High5) and Lucinda Brand (Sunweb).

Vos won stage 7 of the Giro d'Italia Donne at Puegnago del Garda. On the final climb of a punchy circuit, the Dutch star followed the acceleration of Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek-Segafredo) with one kilometre to go and then launched her own sprint with 200 metres to go to take what was her 30th career victory at the Giro d'Italia Donne. Anna van der Breggen crossed the line in third place at Puegnago del Garda.

It was on the third and final Sardinian stage that Vos began to add to her Giro d'Italia victory tally in 2022. The Dutch rider had come close on stage 2, when she was just pipped by Elisa Balsamo (Trek-Segafredo) as the Italian rider took her first victory at the race and Charlotte Kool (Team DSM) took third. The podium order was reshuffled on the slight uphill drag in Olbia.

Vos launched early, just like the day before, but this time she held her advantage through to the line, claiming her 31st stage victory ahead of Kool and Balsamo, who was wearing the maglia rosa.

This time it wasn't a large bunch sprint, as Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek-Segafredo) put in an attack on the steepest part of the climb to Bergamo Alta, that only Vos could follow. Mavi García (UAE Team ADQ) joined over the top while maglia rosa Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar Team) led a group of eight that made the junction with just a kilometre to go to the line. That wasn't the end of the action, however, with Vos also shutting down a move by Kristen Faulkner (BikeExchange-Jayco) and then launching her own winning sprint.

“I’m still catching my breath,” said Vos after the finish. “It was all the time trying to stay in front before the climb on the local lap, and then it was already a sprint before we hit the last climb, another sprint up the climb, and then another sprint here to the line. It was quite hard, but it’s very nice to take the victory."

It was the last victory Vos took at the 2022 Giro Donne as she left the race after stage 6 to prepare for the Tour de France Femmes, where she also took two stage wins.

Kirsten Frattini is the Deputy Editor of Cyclingnews, overseeing the global racing content plan.

Kirsten has a background in Kinesiology and Health Science. She has been involved in cycling from the community and grassroots level to professional cycling's biggest races, reporting on the WorldTour, Spring Classics, Tours de France, World Championships and Olympic Games.

She began her sports journalism career with Cyclingnews as a North American Correspondent in 2006. In 2018, Kirsten became Women's Editor – overseeing the content strategy, race coverage and growth of women's professional cycling – before becoming Deputy Editor in 2023.