Ceratizit Challenge by La Vuelta: Annemiek van Vleuten wins stage 2 time trial

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Olympic time trial champion Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar) put in a dominant ride on the seven-kilometre mountain time trial to Estación de Montaña de Manzaneda on stage 2 of the Ceratizit Challenge by La Vuelta to take the win by 19 seconds ahead of GC leader Marlen Reusser (Ale BTC Ljubljana). Marta Cavalli of FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope took third place, 27 seconds behind Van Vleuten. 

Van Vleuten, who opted to ride her time trial bike on the hilly course, has now moved into third place on the general classification, 1:39 behind Reusser and just three seconds behind Pauliena Rooijakkers (Liv Racing), who sits in second place. 

Thursday’s second-placed rider, Coryn Rivera (Team DSM), put in a strong ride but slipped into fourth overall at 1:45 back. Rivera retained her lead on the points classification going into Saturday’s mountainous road stage. 

“It's nice to win a stage, nice to win the time trial on my Tokyo time trial bike of Canyon, so it was nice to catch up again with my time trial bike after a really nice moments in Tokyo with this bike,” said Van Vleuten after the stage. 

“I chose the time trial bike because it was faster for me because also I train a lot of the time trial bike. I'm not so sure it was a little bit the same road bike or time trial bike, so  I was happy I was riding it. And happy to win.”

On her GC prospects going into the final two stages, van Vleuten said: “I thought after yesterday that will be really difficult if you give Marlen Reusser who is in a really good form two minutes then it's it's really hard. But on the other hand, I'm super excited for tomorrow because in general, I don't like defending style of racing. I also struggle sometimes a little bit with stage races because I have to defend. And in my heart, I'm not a defender, I'm an attacker. So I'm more a one-day racer, and I don't like to race conservative."

The Dutch rider is hoping for a tough final few days of racing in Spain. 

“Tomorrow, I have nothing to lose and everything to win. And I hope other teams also think like that,” she said. “So then we're not going to give it as a present to Marlen Reusser. 

"I hope also that we can put up a good show for the people that are watching it that it will be a super exciting race tomorrow because it has the ingredients tomorrow to make it really hard for Marlen to take the win.”

How it unfolded

The 7.3km individual time trial saw riders climb to Estación de Montaña de Manzaneda with 484 vertical metres gained over the climb. 

One of the first riders off the ramp was Maria Banlles of Sopela, who posted a time of 23:23 which was soon bettered by Cypriot national champion Antri Christoforou, in a time of 22:17.

Soon after, however, 19-year-old Shirin van Anrooij of Trek-Segafredo stormed through the intermediate split with a time of 10:55, eventually stopping the clock in 21:18 -- a time which saw the Dutch rider stay in the hot seat for a while.

That was, until Urška Žigart (Team BikeExchange) posted a new fastest time of 20:31:02. Žigart’s teammate Amanda Spratt posted the second-best time shortly afterwards, 30 seconds down on her Slovenian counterpart. 

Next across the line was time trial World Champion Anna van der Breggen (Team SD Worx), who came through 25 seconds behind Žigart with Leah Thomas (Movistar) hot on her heels. Thomas had the World Champion in her sight as she crossed the line and went into the top spot with a time 25 seconds faster than Žigart’s. 

Thomas’ time in the hot seat was short lived, however, as her Movistar teammate Van Vleuten crossed the line with a time of 19:08 which would hold.

Juliette Labous (Team DSM) crossed the line with an impressive 20:07 to take provisional third but shortly overshadowed by the young Italian Marta Cavalli of FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope who crossed the line with a time of 19:35, putting her in second place.

Kristen Faulkner of TIBCO-Silicon Valley Bank completed the climb with a time of 19:55 which at the time put her into provisional third place, however Reusser’s 19:27 ride put the American down into fourth place. 

GC leader Reusser’s time of 19:27  means she retained the red jersey going into stage three.