Double stage podium in hectic sprint finale at Baloise Ladies Tour

Following on from Wednesday evening’s prologue, a flat and fast stage at Baloise Ladies Tour saw a sprint finish where Team dsm-firmenich PostNL took a double podium finish; with Charlotte Kool in second and Rachele Barbieri in third place.
A controlled day of racing meant that no real breakaway was able to form out front, although a few riders would get around 30 seconds of an advantage before being brought back by the peloton. After some good work by the team, Pfeiffer Georgi was able to pick up some bonus seconds in the intermediate sprints, ahead of the team focusing on the finale and run to the line. It was a nervous finale though and Silje Bader was involved in a crash at around 30 kilometres to go but she was able to remount and rejoin the peloton. The nerves in the peloton continued and Georgi held up by a tumble in the closing ten kilometres but after a strong chase was able to come back to the bunch and help in the lead-out. Coming under the flamme rouge the team moved forward late, coming with speed to position Kool for the finale. With the rise to the line in front of them, stage winner Wiebes launched her sprint early and held on to take the win while Kool and Barbieri produced good kicks to round out the day’s podium.
Kool said: “The team rode well as a unit all day and looked after me well. I think there were a lot of positive things we can say about today’s stage but there also some improvements that we can take into the next stages. It’s nice we have the opportunity in this race to make it perfect in the next sprint stages.”
Team dsm-firmenich PostNL coach Albert Timmer added: “I think in general it was good today, the team rode well together. Silje had a bit of a crash but she’s doing fine at the moment. Otherwise I think the lead-out was good until around 500 metres to go, where we had a bit of a miscommunication at that moment. I think we waited a bit too long to start the sprint. Until that point it was really good, but we have some things to improve and work on in the coming days, so we’re all really motivated to do that and get on the top step.”