Women's Tour: Balsamo takes her first win as World Champion on final stage

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Demi Vollering (Team SD Worx) has won the 2021 edition of The Women's Tour. Winning the stage 3 ITT, the Dutch allrounder took a commanding lead of 1:09 minutes in the general classification and was never in danger of losing the blue leader's jersey on the last three flat stages.

Stage 6 came down to a bunch sprint after a break of five riders had been caught with 14.5 km to go and a few last-ditch attacks were neutralised. In the sprint, world champion Elisa Balsamo (Valcar-Travel & Service) could celebrate her first victory in the rainbow jersey, beating Lorena Wiebes (Team DSM) and Chloe Hosking (Trek-Segafredo) to the line.

How it unfolded

The final stage criss-crossed Suffolk, covering 155.3 km from Haverhill to Felixstowe including two QOM sprints and two intermediate sprints. The leaders of the QOM and sprints classification, Elise Chabbey (Canyon-SRAM) and Nina Kessler (Team TIBCO-Silicon Valley Bank), were unassailable and sure of winning the green QOM jersey and the red sprints jersey, respectively, if they finished the stage.

Wiebes won the first intermediate sprint ahead of Amy Pieters (Team SD Worx) and Clara Copponi (FDJ Nouvelle-Aquitaine Futuroscope) who were divided by only three seconds ahead of the stage and fighting for the overall podium.

After the sprint, Eugenia Bujak (Alé BTC Ljubljana) attacked from the peloton. Dani Christmas (Drops-Le Col s/b Tempur) and Ane Santesteban (Team BikeExchange) went on the chase, and Veronica Ewers (Team TIBCO-Silicon Valley Bank) bridged to them. Finally, Sofia Bertizzolo (Liv Racing) also went off the front.

The five riders joined up with 77 km to go, and Team SD Worx were happy to control the gap at 2:25 minutes. This increased to 3:10 minutes when the break was briefly stopped by a level crossing – only for the peloton to stop at the same level crossing shortly afterwards.

On the final 50 kilometres, Team SD Worx and the sprinters’ Team DSM and Valcar-Travel & Service steadily reduced the gap to the breakaway, finally making the catch with just after the 15-kilometre mark.

This meant that several riders tried to anticipate a bunch sprint with late attacks, but none of them were successful, and the peloton got ready for another sprint finish. On the finishing straight, Balsamo came alongside Wiebes and passed the Dutch sprinter on the final metres to take her first victory in the rainbow jersey.

Vollering lost a few seconds due to splits in the peloton at the finish and wins the general classification 1:02 minutes ahead of Juliette Labous (Team DSM) and 1:05 minutes ahead of Copponi who is also the best U23 rider. Pieters in fourth place missed the overall podium by only two seconds. Wiebes takes home the light-blue points points jersey, Team SD Worx won the team classification.