Team admits Lotta Hentalla held onto car but that she also didn’t, or something

On Thursday, AG Insurance-Soudal-QuickStep’s Lotta Henttala was disqualified by race officials for holding onto the team car during stage 6 of the Tour de France Femmes. Following the incident, her directeur sportif, Servais Knaven and driver of the car was also given the boot. Knaven is a former pro who rode for the Dutch TVM team in the ’90s.

It was a busy day for race officials, as they also ejected SD Worx Danny Stam from the TdFF drafting Demi Vollering back onto the bunch.

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On Friday, AG Insurance-Soudal-QuickStep posted a statement about the disqualification on Twitter. (Or X, or whatever. Do we say X now? Ar we supposed to say the person Xed out a statement? The URL stills says twitter.com, so who knows anymore?).

“During the race, a bidon was passed to Lotta, which both she and Servais held on to for around 10 seconds, giving Lotta a small moment of respite. It is an incident that both regret and understand it is outside the spirit of the race,” the post began. Sticky bottles are usually allowed for a few seconds, but 10 is pushing it. Either way, the team went on to state that the rider shouldn’t have been DQed.

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“However, AG Insurance-Soudal Quick-Step, Servais and Lotta condemn suggestions that Lotta was allowed to hold on to the car for an extended period of time, a charge laid to them by the race jury, leading to disqualification from the race of both Lotta and Servais from the race,” the tweet/X, whatever, read. “We have expressed our disappointment to the race commissioners, pointing out the injustice of their actions and the damage caused to the reputation of Lotta, Servais and the AG Insurance-Soudal Quick-Step team.”

A statement regards to Lotta Hentalla and Servais Knaven’s disqualification from Le Tour de France Femmeshttps://t.co/hlKrbBXeLj pic.twitter.com/2s6EJuWQWQ

— AG Insurance – Soudal Quick-Step Cycling Team (@agi_sou_qst) July 29, 2023