PROVINS, France: Dutch rider Marianne Vos took over the yellow jersey within the ladies’s Tour de France with victory in a three-way dash to win the second stage from Meaux to Provins on Monday.
Workforce Jumbo-Visma’s Vos edged out Silvia Persico and Katarzyna Niewiadoma to assert the jersey from compatriot Lorena Wiebes who completed 29 seconds behind in sixth place.
“It’s not revenge, it’s a completely fantastic day,” stated Vos who completed second behind Wiebes in Sunday’s opening stage on the Champs-Elysees.
Trek-Segafredo’s Elisa Longo Borghini, winner of Paris-Roubaix and a particular contender for the yellow jersey in France, completed fourth within the stage, two seconds again.
Much less lucky was her Italian compatriot Marta Cavalli, winner of this 12 months of the Amstel Gold and the Fleche-Wallonne and a possible winner of the general title right here.
The 24-year-old was taken to hospital after struggling a head damage in one among three nasty crashes in a final 30 kilometers the place the crosswinds and gusts of as much as 45 km/h made the riders jumpy concerning the prospect of a break within the peloton.
“We don’t have a lot information from Marta, she is affected by a head damage,” stated group supervisor Stephen Delcourt on arrival in Provins.
“We stay in touch with the physician. She has been despatched to the hospital to hold out a CT scan as a precedence.”
The FDJ-Suez-Futuroscope rider was already on the bottom when she was hit by Australian champion Nicole Frain who got here flying by way of with out braking.
Cavalli, who was runner-up on this 12 months’s Giro d’Italia, climbed again on her bike however failed to complete the stage with the group pulling her out and sending her to hospital.
“She suffered a giant shock. We didn’t wish to take any dangers,” stated Delcourt.
“She needed to hold on however the group stated no. We don’t wish to play with the lives of us runners.
“We’re very nervous. You noticed the very spectacular crash and the way harmful our sport is. We actually must watch out. I’m very nervous for the protection of our riders.”
It was a foul day all spherical for FDJ as Danish rider Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig, their different potential challenger, bought caught up in one other crash and misplaced greater than a minute to Vos, Longo Borghini and Niewiadoma.
Along with Cavalli, one other Italian Gaia Masetti additionally gave up in addition to the German Laura Suessemilch, who’s present process hospital assessments for doable fractures, in line with her Plantur-Pura group.
French rider Maeva Squiban completed the stage however “couldn’t stroll” on arrival, in line with her group, Stade Rochelais, and “took an X-ray.”
For 35-year-old Vos, one of many nice names of biking with three world highway championships and Olympic observe gold amongst her many honors, this yellow jersey has a way of unfinished enterprise.
She received on the Champs-Elysees in 2014 within the first version of La Course which occurred on the final day of the boys’s Tour de France, a race she helped to launch.
As a toddler she pressed her mother and father to take her to observe the Tour.
“We had been going to Alpe d’Huez, to the dash finishes, to Pau,” she stated once more initially in Meaux on Monday. “That was how we spent our summer time holidays, driving the course in our tenting van.”
Vos now leads the final classification with a 10-second lead over Valcar rider Persico, with Niewiadoma of Canyon-SRAM two seconds additional again.
Tuesday’s stage three also needs to go well with the sprinters with a 133.6km journey by way of the Champagne area from Reims to Epernay. The race ends in Paris on Sunday.
