Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar) came into the season with an ambitious goal of winning all three grand tours, and while she succeeded at La Vuelta Femenina and the Giro d’Italia Donne, she was upset to have finished just off the podium in fourth place at the Tour de France Femmes.
“Of course, there’s disappointment that I was not good the last two days,” Van Vleuten said.
“I was in the battle and gave it my all. I didn’t make any mistakes, or think that I was not smart or that I did something wrong. I don’t know what happened, I was obviously not myself. And that’s a bit sad for my last Tour de France. I don’t know what happened.”
Van Vleuten came into the eight-day race as the defending champion and as one of the overwhelming favourites but struggled on the two final decisive days.
On stage 7, she finished third on the Col du Tourmalet 2:34 behind winner Demi Vollering (SD Worx). On the stage 8 time trial in Pau, she finished 14th at 1:41 behind Vollering. She dropped one place in the overall classification finishing fourth at 3:59 behind the Tour de France Femmes overall winner, Vollering.
Although she expressed disappointment in her performances, she also said that she felt unwell and had stomach problems following the queen stage 7 on the summit of the Tourmalet and that those symptoms carried into the morning of the time trial.
“When I woke up this morning, I already felt off. Yesterday evening I felt like I would be sick this morning. I was not really sick, I didn’t have a temperature that was high, but I said I’d give it a go, you never know,” Van Vleuten said.
“But I already know from how I was riding yesterday on the Tourmalet, I think people that watch more women’s cycling know it is not the level I normally have.”
“Knowing how I felt and that it was hard to recover from that stage in a short time, I was hoping for it and going for it, but I knew that it would be hard.”
Van Vleuten said there were highlights from this week, too, in watching her teammates Liane Lippert and Emma Norsgaard secure stage victories.
“Yes, it’s a huge disappointment for me, for my own performance. But not for the team performances, it was super nice to share the win of Liane and Emma, two beautiful wins out of eight stages,” Van Vleuten said.
Our champion. And many people’s.@AvVleuten completes her final @LeTourFemmes avec @GoZwift stage.Miek is 4th overall to cap off an outstanding Grand Tour season, winning La Vuelta and the Giro Donne.#RodamosJuntos |…
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