Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling’s Laura Trott finished safely in the main peloton on the fifth and final stage of the Energiewacht Tour, between Groningen and Haren in the northeastern Netherlands, to confirm her overall third place in the young riders classification. Emily Collins was Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling’s best finisher, in 19th place, as a nine-rider break escaped to contest the stage victory. With most of the strong teams represented in the breakaway it was not possible to chase it down.
“Orica, Rabobank and Argos all had a rider in the group,” confirmed Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling directeur sportif Simon Cope, “and after the hard week that the girls have had there was no way that they were going to chase it down on their own.
“It’s been a hard week,” he added. “Racing in the Netherlands is always tough – especially when it’s windy – and most of them have never done a stage race at this level before. The work they did in the first couple of stages has taken its toll, but on the whole I’m very pleased with their performance.”
The stage was won by Valentina Carretta (MCipollini-Giordana) after she escaped the breakaway in the closing kilometres. Korean rider Sungeun Gu (Orica-AIS) outsprinted German Romy Kasper (Boels-Dolmans) in the race for second place. The overall victory went to Ellen van Dijk (Specialized-lululemon) thanks to her victory in the stage 3a time trial.
As well as Trott’s third place in the young riders classification – which was good enough for 21st in the general classification behind van Dijk – Wiggle Honda Pro Cycling finished eighth in the team classification but, more importantly, the team takes away several positive things from its first European stage race.
“There are a number of lessons to learn, but there are a lot of positives,” Cope confirmed. “All of the girls have given everything but, more importantly, they’ve raced together as a team so well.
“There are a lot of teams that have been around for years that don’t race together as well as Wiggle Honda has done this week,” he added. “The girls really rode hard for each other, which is a real positive for the future.”
