VolkerWessels were one of the standout teams at the Tour of Chongming Island. Although somewhat overshadowed by Ceratizit-WNT winning all three stages and the GC, the Dutch team had its sprinters Sofie van Rooijen and Scarlett Souren place fourth and fifth on stage 1 as well as second and third on stage 3, with Souren finishing third overall to win the white U23 jersey. Van Rooijen was one spot further down in GC, and Anne Knijnenburg took home the QOM jersey.
"Our plan was to go for the GC through the sprint finishes and the bonus seconds at the intermediate plan. On stage 2, they chose the wrong side of the road in the sprint and did not get a result. That meant the GC was gone. But we still had the white jersey, took the QOM and then tried to win the stage with Scarlett," explained team manager Raymond Rol to Cyclingnews.
Rol denied speculation that the team had forgone last week's Simac Ladies Tour in their home country in the hunt for UCI points: "We had three teams for Varese, Simac and the China races, but six of our riders were not fit for Simac, so we cancelled it. I think we do the most races of all teams, and the planning was always to go to China," he said.
The VolkerWessels team was included on early team lists for the Simac Ladies Tour before they pulled out. In the 2024 season, the team will have done 112 UCI race days plus several Dutch or Belgian non-UCI races, significantly more than most Women's WorldTour teams who have lined up between 80 and 100 times, with only a few teams above the 100 days of racing mark.
The team is in good spirits as it travels to Guangxi for the final race of the season, the Tour of Guangxi one-day race. In the UCI ranking, they already were ahead of Women's WorldTour team Roland and stand to also pass Uno-X Mobility once the points from the Chinese races (where the Norwegian team isn't racing) are calculated.
Going into 2024, the team was only fifth in the ranking of Women's Continental Teams, missing the automatic invitations and not getting a wildcard for the Tour de France Femmes. This was a hard blow to the team that (then still named Parkhotel Valkenburg) has had Demi Vollering, Lorena Wiebes, Mischa Bredewold, Pauliena Rooijakkers, Karlijn Swinkels, and many other WWT riders pass through its ranks, missing out on starting the Dutch Grand Départ.
For 2025, though, the coveted automatic invitation to all Women's WorldTour races seems virtually secure, with the last remaining hoop to jump through being registration in the new Women's ProTeam category.
"Hopefully, we will be pro next year, and with the points we collected, we will have the wildcard. I'm looking forward to next year with the talent factory," said Rol.
