It is the reaction of Marianne Vos that best summarizes the denouement of the World Championship road race for women in Wollongong, Australia. Shaking her head, her hands raised in the air and an expression somewhere between crying and laughing, she cycles across the finish line. As if, like all other riders, spectators and television viewers at home, she thinks: What happened here?
Here’s what happened: Annemiek van Vleuten became world cycling champion for the second time in her career. In 2019 she already showed herself to be the best in British Yorkshire, after an impressive solo of 105 kilometers. But this win, here in Australia, was perhaps even more impressive.
Everything won
Whoever said a week ago that Van Vleuten would become world champion was not saying so much. The 39-year-old rider has been one of the best in the world for years and won just about everything she competed this season: Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the Giro d’Italia, the Tour de France, the Vuelta a España. In addition, the difficult course, with a big climb on Mount Keira and then a few tough hills, suited her.
But at the start of the game, seven days later, no one believed in her chances, not even Van Vleuten himself. That started with a mediocre time trial a week ago along the Australian east coast. The Olympic time trial champion was one of the favorites for the world title in that discipline, but she disappointed with seventh place. Van Vleuten knows afterwards to a complete off day – and maybe she was tired after a long and successful season.
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Photo Dean Lewins/EPA
Things went from bad to worse on Wednesday, when Van Vleuten crashed due to a mechanical problem during the mixed relay. She flopped onto the asphalt on her side, and sat in a daze. Examination at the hospital revealed a fracture in her elbow, which she could barely straighten.
End of story, it seemed, but Van Vleuten went to train anyway, to see how she drove around, if she could switch on. She barely got out of the saddle and couldn’t stand on the pedals, but the way she often makes the difference. But it was enough, she thought, not to write herself off completely before Saturday.
In the meantime, the Dutch women’s selection had to deal with the following setback: Demi Vollering tested positive for corona. It had been the last straw for Van Vleuten, she would say afterwards, now she had to start herself. All balls to head woman Vos. Van Vleuten let her family and friends in the Netherlands know that they could stay the night in peace – she was going to be a servant and nothing more, so there was no point in getting up early to look.
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Favorite less
And so the match starts in the Dutch night from Friday to Saturday with one less favorite, or so is the general opinion. Van Vleuten’s plan to go on the attack at 125 kilometers from the finish, on Mount Keira, has disappeared in the trash. On television, the NOS commentators wonder aloud whether Van Vleuten will make it to the finish. When Van Vleuten has to unload on a small climb 25 kilometers before the finish, just like leader Vos, the Dutch women’s selection seems condemned to an anonymous edition of the World Cup.
Van Vleuten and Ellen van Dijk, the brand new world time trial champion, report once more at the front of the pack to drive Vos back to the front of the race. The plan fails, Vos cannot come. But it does ensure that Van Vleuten suddenly ends up in the group of pursuers behind the leading group. She sees that her leader can’t keep up, and thinks to herself: if we come back at the front, I’ll get one chance.
That chance is escaping, just before the finish, pushing hard one more time, and then hoping to get enough lead to stay away from a sprinting group of pursuers. There is less than a kilometer to go when Van Vleuten launches himself. Nobody sees it coming: not even the helicopter’s cameras register the start of its attack. Out of nowhere, Van Vleuten suddenly seems to fly through the image.
She gets a hole, a few tens of meters, the women behind her step on the pedals, Van Vleuten lifts herself out of her saddle, the lead gets smaller, the distance to the finish line too, and then she is suddenly over it. Van Vleuten is so surprised that she forgets to cheer. It is only when Vos and Van Dijk come to congratulate her that it dawns on her: she has won. For a moment all pain is forgotten, and she screams with joy as she stretches both arms, including the one with the broken elbow, towards the sky.
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Photo William West/AFP
disbelief
“I’m waiting for someone to come and tell me it’s not true. I expected to be overtaken at any moment, but they did not come,” Van Vleuten told the NOS afterwards, while the disbelief is chiseled on her face. How did she do it? “It was really hell today, I couldn’t stand because of my elbow, my legs hurt terribly. But I have a lot of content, I don’t break that easily.” A classic, three Grand Tours and now the rainbow jersey, all in one year. “I’ve had an incredible season, all my goals have come true,” she says, almost shyly.
Marianne Vos, who eventually becomes fourteenth, shakes her head again after the finish. “Pfooaahh”, is the sound she produces for the NOS camera, heavily impressed by Van Vleuten’s performance. “I saw what was happening from afar. This is unbelievable, she won’t break. Annemiek is Annemiek.”