An extremely explosive day in a baking hot Women’s Tour Down Under stage two was taken by Ally Wollaston (FDJ United-Suez), who had to dig extremely deep to make it two from two and to power to another amazing victory ahead of defending champion Noemi Rüegg (EF Education-Oatly) and Josie Nelson (Picnic-PostNL).
It was an afternoon of attacking from a huge array of wonderful riders, with a full plethora of attackers trying to cause chaos with FDJ United-Suez trying desperately to control things for their leader and stage one winner, Wollaston. The French team managed to come out on top yet again despite all the dangerous attacks.
“It feels amazing. I was feeling really not good. I said I wasn’t feeling good. I found it so hard to move up. In the last 10km, something just happens in the brain, and then I’m here on the front, so I am just so happy,” said a jubilant Wollaston.
“I just had to have full belief in my team with such a strong breakaway. The girls just did everything they could and I just had to sit there hoping it came back. I’m looking forward to it tomorrow and I’ll give everything I can and we’ll see how it goes.”
Wollaston keeps hold of the ochre leader’s jersey for the final stage tomorrow, as well as the lead in the points classification, with British rider Nelson wearing that on her behalf again tomorrow.
The mountains jersey is handed from Alessia Vigilia (Uno-X Mobility) to Paula Blasi (UAE Team ADQ), who has a big lead going into the final day. The white young rider’s jersey stays with Justyne Czapla (Canyon-SRAM-Zondacrupto).
This year’s third and final stage is a demanding 126.5km of racing from Norwood to Campbelltown via two ascents of the Corkscrew climb with an average gradient of 9.7%.
How it unfolded
The day started in Magill in the high 20s Celsius, with the forecast set to reach around 37 degrees Celsius over the day, where the riders tackled the 130.7km route with over 2400 metres of elevation to Paracombe. As the flag dropped to start the race, the riders were immediately climbing on the 10km Ashton climb that had an average gradient of 4% but with kicks over 12%. There were three non-starters: Katia Ragusa (Human Powered Health), Rebecca Koerner (Uno-X Mobility) and Georgia Baker (Liv-AlUla-Jayco).
This early test did see some activity in the bunch with Rosita Reijnhout (Visma-Lease a…
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