Tour, Longo Borghini party: 600 days in the race in 12 years of career

A long round of applause, and not only at the start of the second stage of the Tour de France in Clermont Ferrand. The applause comes from all the enthusiasts, because Elisa Longo Borghini is a champion who has contributed to changing and making the Italian and international women’s movement grow. Today’s stage of the Tour was the 600th day spent racing by the Piedmontese since 26 February 2011: professional debut with the Top Girls jersey in a very heartfelt Belgian classic like the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad. Longo Borghini had just turned 19, and that day he finished fifth, 4″ behind the winner, the Swedish Johansson. Since then it has been a crescendo in the great classics and in stage races, even if the joy that she is waiting for has not yet arrived at the Giro d’Italia: second in 2017, third in 2020, fourth in 2022, fifth in 2014, just as she finished sixth in the Tour in 2022 and finished twice in the Vuelta times second, in 2020 and 2022.

Pioneer At a time when everyone is talking about Denmark and Norway, Elisa Longo Borghini had no hesitations at the age of 20 to go racing with a Norwegian team, Hitech, from 2012 to 2014, to then move on to the British team Wiggle from 2015 to 2018, and then give a change to the Italian movement with Trek-Segafredo in 2018: the team directed by Luca Guercilena who has made equality between men and women, in all the fields, an essential point. If the WorldTour was born and now the girls have a world circuit of the highest level, with live television and coaches like the men’s, it is thanks to the commitment of Trek and characters like Longo Borghini. Now the team has the German food giant Lidl as its first name, confirming that women also represent a formidable opportunity for sporting investment.

VICTORIES

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In these 12 and a half years of career, the Piedmontese from Ornavasso (Verbania), a neighbor of Pippo Ganna, hasn’t won a lot: 40 hits. But very heavy. Like the two consecutive Olympic bronze medals in the road race, in Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2021, never achieved by any other blue cyclist. And then the podiums at the World Cup: bronze in that 2012, in Valkenburg, at the age of 20, beaten by the Dutchman Vos and the New Zealander Neylan, and at Imola 2020, in the midst of the Covid era, behind the Dutchmen Van der Breggen and Van Vleuten. But we remember her as the superfine director of that magical day in Leuven 2021 in Belgium, she paving the way towards the rainbow for teammate Elisa Balsamo.

The classics In the line trials, however, the most beautiful joys arrive: the Tour of Flanders 2015 and the Paris-Roubaix 2022, the first Italian to succeed, after a solo breakaway of over 30 km that began in the paved sector of Templeuve, the one dear to Franco Ballerini. Then the Strade Bianche in Siena in 2017, the Binda Trophy in Cittiglio twice (2013 and 2021), the Tre Valli Varesine 2022, three Tours of Emilia on top of San Luca in Bologna (2015, 2016 and 2022). Very attached to the tricolor jersey, a second skin for Elisa: eleven Italian titles, four in line and seven in the time trial.

But Longo Borghini’s fairy tale is not over: in addition to the Tour de France in progress, in two weeks there is the World Cup in Glasgow in Scotland, and then in 2024 another Olympics. Italy will never stop saying thank you.