Marlen Reusser (SD Worx-Protime) powered to her first victory in 2024 after stealing a march on the downhill run to the line in La Vall d'Uixó on stage 2 of the Setmana Ciclista Volta Femenina de la Comunitat Valenciana.
The Swiss time trial specialist employed all of her power on the flat and aerodynamic prowess to stay away from the chasing group of favourites that she attacked with 5.9km left to race.
Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease a Bike) easily won the sprint behind, but, having missed Reusser’s move off the front of the leading group, she was forced to settle for second for the second time in as many days.
Evita Muzic (Groupama-FDJ) was third.Yesterday’s stage winner Elisa Balsamo (Lidl-Trek) fell out of the race lead after being dropped inside the final 30km on the penultimate climb.
Reusser heads into tomorrow’s queen stage with the orange leader’s jersey.
“I’m super happy, really grateful for the team to help me. I hoped it would be a good day and we could do something nice, me or someone else from the team, and it was a really cool final; I’m so happy,” said Reusser after the finish.
How it unfolded
The 117km stage got underway from Borriol with Margot Vanpachtenbeke (VolkerWessels Women's Pro Cycling Team) and Imogen Cotter (Hess Cycling Team) taking up the mantle of attacking in the opening phases.
The duo weren’t allowed much of an advantage with the peloton keeping it tight and reeling them in before the climbs that characterised the stage’s final 40 kilometres.
As the peloton hit the Puerto de Ahín (14.5km at 2.6%), attacks were launched from Clara Edmond (EF Education Cannondale) and FDJ-Suez, but no group would be allowed much joy as DSM-Firmenich PostNL came to the fore at the head of the race.
The second categorised climb of the day, Puerto de Eslida (5.1km at 6.2%) was where the action kicked off properly as Elise Chabbey (Canyon SRAM) was one of those to try and jump away.
Riejanne Markus (Visma-Lease a Bike) struggled and dropped off the back, but the Dutch team would have been delighted to still have Vos up there. It seems the icon of the sport is back up to form after her arduous year with multiple iliac artery surgeries and periods of recovery.
With Balsamo dropped, Vos was the heavy favourite as the remainder of the action left to race only included a descent to the finish. The pace was high, with Kasia Niewiadoma and Vos leading the group down, but as the Canyon SRAM rider slowed up and took a look behind, Reusser launched.
The Swiss champion put the hammer down as the chasers looked to each other to pull her back, but no one could or wanted to match Reusser’s spike in power. Her gap quickly grew to five, ten, then 20 seconds as the kilometres ticked by at a rapid pace on the downhill.
Reusser was able to celebrate solo for SD Worx Protime's fifth win of the season with an eventual winning margin of 29 seconds on Vos and the rest of the chasers. Reusser’s overall lead heading into stage 3 is 27 seconds on the Dutchwoman.
She'll have to defend her orange jersey on a brutal 129km route from Alicante to Xorret de Catí with top pure climbers Niewiadoma, Muzic and Juliette Labous (DSM-Firmenich PostNL) just half a minute down on GC.
Results
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