D-1 - Garcia: “Everything can happen”
September 6 th 2022 - 19:00 [GMT + 2]
Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar) is “excited to start from Cantabria”… And many more stars of the peloton are lining up to battle for glory on the roads of the Ceratizit Challenge by La Vuelta 22, as they try to overthrow the Dutch conqueror of the 2021 edition, also a winner of the Giro Donne and the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift this season.
The top 10 riders from the overall standings of the Tour are in Spain for new battles. At 39 years old, Van Vleuten leads the way, followed by her younger compatriot Demi Vollering (SD Worx). Third on the podium of the Tour, Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon//Sram Racing) will be eager to make the most of her punch on the explosive roads of the Ceratizit Challenge.
The list goes on with the French climber Juliette Labous (Team DSM), a couple of Italians - the 2021 sensation Silvia Persico (Valcar-Travel & Service) and the highly decorated Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek-Segafredo), winner of Paris-Roubaix Femmes this Spring -, the Danish dynamite Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig (FDJ Suez Futuroscope)…
The peloton also feature the world champion Elisa Balsamo (Trek-Segafredo) and many classic experts who will be eager to hunt stages: Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx), Emma Norsgaard (Movistar), Liane Lippert (Team DSM), Marta Bastianelli (UAE Team ADQ), Chiara Consonni (Valcar-Travel & Service), Maria Giulia Confalonieri (Ceratizit-WNT)…
Garcia: “I returned home and I trained well”
As for the Spanish champion Mavi Garcia (UAE Team ADQ), 3rd of the Giro Donne and 10th in the Tour after a series of unfortunate accidents, she recently showed she’s ready to shine in her home stage race with a victory in the Classic Lorient Agglomération-Trophée Ceratizit at the end of August.
“It has been a very important victory, my first in a World Tour classic”, Garcia says. “I’m feeling very good. I have accomplished what I wanted this season”, she observes, as she overcame the bad luck she suffered in Le Tour Femmes.
“I had prepared to do well in the Tour but some circumstances played against us”, she describes. “I returned home and I trained well for three weeks.”
With a star studded startlist, Garcia highlights many rivals for the top positions in the overall standings: “If Vollering has recovered from her concussion, she’ll be up there. Van Vleuten obviously is eyeing this race. And then the same riders as always: Elisa Longo Borghini, Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig, Kasia Niewiadoma…”
The Spanish champion also knows where she wants to make her mark on her national roads: “Stage 2 will be decisive. I think it’s hard enough to make significant differences. Still, many things can still happen later in the race. On stage 3, with a long climb and then a plateau, the wind can be brutal. Everything can happen.”
