Charlotte Kool and DSM-Firmenich PostNL have a new secret weapon for 2024, and her name is Rachele Barbieri.
The Dutch sprinter hit new heights during her sophomore 2023 season, racking up 13 wins, and she can now look forward to more success this season with a new face in her lead-out train.
This summer, Kool will be eyeing the opening stage and the first yellow jersey of the 2024 Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift on home ground in The Hague. She’s confident that the Italian Barbieri, a new signing for 2024, and her revamped lead-out train, will deliver her to the perfect position for the highly anticipated bunch sprint and a likely face-off against the world’s leading sprinter, Lorena Wiebes.
“Our lead-out has changed. Rachele Barbieri will be my last lead-out, and Pfeiffer Georgi will go back to her previous position,” Kool said of the riders that will form her last two lead-outs in the DSM-Firmenich PostNL train.
“Barbieri is a really nice addition. Pfeiffer is really important in our lead-out, but we were missing additional speed in the end.”
Barbieri joins the team after spending two seasons at Liv Racing TeqFind, having previously raced for BePink, WIggle High 5 and Cylance. She’s been on the podium in numerous races, including a stage at the Giro d’Italia and Baloise Ladies Tour, and started her DSM stint off well with a second place on the opening day at the UAE Tour Women.
She’s also enjoyed a sparkling career on the track, winning the world title in the Scratch Race in 2017 and gold in the Madison and Omnium events from the European Championships in 2022.
In an interview with Cyclingnews, Kool explained her new lead-out train, which she said could change throughout the season, depending on the terrain and rider availability, but ultimately, the last three riders will remain the same.
The lead-out begins with Franziska Koch. Then, Pfeiffer Georgi will take over at the front, followed by Kool’s last lead-out woman, Rachele Barbieri.
“And then it’s up to me, in that order,” Kool said.
In the 2023 season, Kool experienced being the team’s sole sprint leader for the first time in her career after Wiebes’ departure to SD Worx. In last season’s lead-out, Georgi was the rider to deliver Kool into the final sprint.
Georgi is a rider with such versatility that she can initiate breakaways, lead out her team’s top sprinter, and win top-tier events for herself as we saw during her breakthrough season last year. However, both she and Kool both agreed the…
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