Three-time individual time trial World Champion Ellen van Dijk (Lidl-Trek) proved unbeatable in her specialty and won the opening stage of the Tour de Normandie on Thursday.
She took the hot seat after 62 other riders completed the 10.3km course in a time of 13:32 and secured a second ITT win in two efforts this season. She took the first leader’s jersey for the four-day stage race.
The Visma-Lease a Bike duo of Riejanne Markus and Lieke Nooijen completed the podium, with Markus 19 seconds back and Nooijen 24 seconds back.
The Lidl-Trek rider recently returned to racing after taking 18 months away from the sport to give birth to her first child. In her first event this season at Vuelta Extremadura Féminas, Van Dijk won the 17.2km time trial and finished sixth in the overall.
The 10.3km route took riders on a counter-clockwise circuit on the west side of Bagnoles-de-l’Orne, with the sharpest climb in the opening 500 metres followed by a series of two tight corners on the sloping descent. The course provided for long, flat stretches, with only four 90-degree turns over the middle sections and a series of technical turns in the final kilometre.
The first rider to complete the course was Britain Tamsin Miller (DAS-Handsling Bikes), who set the marker of 14:24.
Before Van Dyke exploded across the course, Marion Borras (St Michel-Mavic-Auber93) went into the hot seat with a time of 14:02. Twenty-one-year-old Daniel Hengeveld (Team dsm-firmenich-PostNL) rode in a time of 14:05 and the duo would only see three other riders set faster times.
French TT champion and 2023 Normandie winner Cédrine Kerbaol (Ceratizit-WNT Pro Cycling) finished sixth, 39 seconds down on Van Dijk.
The 2023 Tour de Normandie Féminin did not include an individual time trial. Now in its second edition, the race expanded from three to four days. Friday’s second day of racing takes in 138.2km from Le Neubourge to Pavilly.
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