After a hard day of climbing, the second stage of Tour de Romandie came down to Canyon-SRAM’s Kasia Niewiadoma and Tour de France Femmes winner Demi Vollering (SD Worx). In the end, Vollering proved the better of the two, taking the win by two seconds over the veteran Polish rider. Vollering’s teammate Marlen Reusser finished third four seconds after Niewiadoma.
With the stage victory, Vollering also claimed the overall from stage 1 winner Sofia Bertizzolo (UAE Team ADQ). The Dutch national champion leads the general classification by six seconds over Niewiadoma before the third and final stage on Sunday.
- SD Worx and UAE Team ADQ both had strong riders up the road. Anna Shackley, who finished second for Great Britain at the recent Tour de l’Avenir behind Shirin van Anrooij, has been part of the SD Worx team since 2021 and continues to improve season after season. The 22-year-old has had some bad luck this year but the breakaway helped her to secure ninth on the stage. The UAE Team ADQ rider with her was Silvia Persico, one of the revelations of 2022 who hasn’t had quite as good a season in 2023 but is still an exciting prospect for the future.
- The climbs did most of the damage on the peloton. The first category 1 climb caused fractures before the final ascent that, under the pressure of Canyon-SRAM, further reduced the peloton so when Vollering eventually pushed the pace, what was left of the group couldn’t stay together.
- SD Worx landed three riders in the top five with Niamh Fisher-Black finishing fifth, a great ride for the youngster that put her into yet another Youth Classification jersey ahead of the final stage.
- Niewiadoma did the majority of the work after Vollering broke the reduced group. The Dutchwoman made her move just under 4 km to go when the climb relented for a few hundred meters, enough for a few of the climbers to struggle on some technical downhill turns.
- Niewiadoma attacked no less than ten times on stage 1, and was impressive again on stage 2 with multiple attacks, but she couldn’t shake Vollering in the final kilometres.
Stage 2 results
GC standings after Stage 2
Quote of the day
At Itzulia Women in May, Vollering surprised viewers when SD Worx flipped the script on the final stage allowing Reusser to win the final stage and thus take overall from her Dutch teammate. It was a turning point for the Swiss rider’s career; she went on to win the Tour de Suisse a few weeks later and the victories only bolstered the confidence of an incredibly strong (and humble) rider.
Although Vollering was happy to take the stage on Saturday, the Dutch team could shake up their tactics on the final stage into Nyon according to Vollering’s post race interview.
The goal was to win it as a team so if I can keep [the jersey] it’s good I think, but ya, it’s also nice if Marlen can win tomorrow, of course. Let’s see how it goes. The most important is that the jersey stays in the team.
Vollering after the stage
Up next: Stage 3 (the final stage) from Vernier to Nyon
The final stage, 131.9 km from Vernier to Nyon, features two laps of a circuit containing two category 3 climbs, but there are a handful of other climbs along the route that are uncategorized.
The entire stage is up and down, up and down, on twisty roads that lend themselves to a breakaway or a reduced group. With the technical nature of the course, chasing will be difficult if something is able to slip up the road.
Canyon-SRAM, one of the most aggressive teams in the peloton, is sure to make the final stage a good one. Niewiadoma is only six seconds off the lead of the race, and we know the Polish rider loves to attack – any attempt at drinking games are sure to end badly (please don’t!).
It might finally be the day for Niewiadoma. The stage looks great for her, especially with the descent to the line. It could also be another Vollering victory, the Dutchwoman will be hard to drop. Perhaps it could also be a home-soil win for Reusser, who is looking strong as per usual, after taking third on Saturday.
An outside bet could be the one and only Jolanda Neff, representing Team Switzerland. The former mountain bike cross country world champion nearly won a stage of Tour de Suisse in 2022 by simply descending away from the race with Lucinda Brand (Lidl-Trek), who is not at the race this year. Brand took the stage, and the overall victory, but the course was a similar one and could favor someone line Neff who is willing to take some risks.
Live coverage of the third stage can be found on GCN+ starting at 14:10 CEST on Sunday.
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