The opening day of racing at the Simac Ladies Tour saw the bunch take on a few large laps – based in the area around Leylestad. Heading out into the more exposed roads, the early part of the day saw lots of attacks as teams tried to split things in the little wind there was, with the team active and aware, making sure they were represented in any move. Things came back together and through the first intermediate sprint Pfeiffer Georgi and Lorena Wiebes took second and third respectively, picking up some bonus seconds to go along with it.

After another period of relative calm, the action started once more and the race winning move of 19 riders went clear; with Charlotte Kool, Franziska Koch and Wiebes making the split for the team with 60 kilometres to go. The gap held relatively steady, fluctuating between 30 seconds and one minute for the majority of the run-in. Koch and Kool did a brilliant job to close down any dangerous attacks that peppered the front of the group and hold things together for a sprint finale. One last pull from Koch saw the final attack shut down at around one and a half kilometres to go, before Kool expertly brought Wiebes forward. Doing an incredible pull through the final few twists and turns in the closing kilometre, Kool flicked her elbow to release Wiebes at 200 metres to go. Putting down the power, no one was able to come close to Wiebes’ dominant sprint as she sat up to celebrate a first win in the European Champions jersey.

With the result on the line, Wiebes moves into the race lead for the team ahead of tomorrow’s second stage.

“As expected there was some wind out there today,” explained Wiebes at the finish. “The group broke after the first time passing the finish line and we had four riders in there, but it all came back with headwind. On another crosswind part there was a big crash and Pfeiffer was caught up in it, so that was not the best situation for us, and it split the race. The group behind never came back and we focused on the stage win. Franzi did a great job with keeping the pace and closing the attacks in the last five kilometres and Charlotte then brought me in the perfect position through the last corner. I’m super happy to finish it off for them.”