Elisa Longo Borghini and her team-mate Shirin van Anrooij looked at each other in disbelief, almost shock, just after the finish line in Oudenaarde. "What have we just done here?" the 22-year-old Dutchwoman whispered to the experienced Italian. Minutes earlier, she had won the race in a furious final after 2015 won her second Tour of Flanders. The Lidl-Trek team showed unity and unity, but above all a clearly recognisable plan on each of the 163 kilometres in the most adverse conditions on East Flanders' roads. Days before the "Ronde", experts had already warned of the Koppenberg, marking the 600 metre long and on average 11.6 percent steep climb in rainy conditions as the key point in the race.
And that's exactly what happened. When Lotte Kopecky and Demi Vollering from Team SD Worx-Protime, both of whom had started the race as top favourites, were positioned far too far back and even had to come off their bikes briefly on the slippery cobbles, the decisive group of the day formed around the eventual winner Longo Borghini. In the winner's interview after the extremely demanding race, she said: "We had a clear strategy, rode very cohesively as a team and luckily I was the strongest in the end. When Shirin was alone in front after the Paterberg in the final, I joined her together with Kasia Niewiadoma after a brief consultation with the team management. As a pair, we had the better cards in the final metres."
Spring classics: crumbling dominance of Team SD Worx-Protime
After the overwhelming superiority of Team SD Worx-Protime in the spring of last year, the victory and third place by the Lidl-Trek riders were a very clear indication that past successes are no guarantee for victories in the present - even if the expectations of fans, the environment and within the SD Worx team itself were high with regard to the 2024 spring classics season. The first cracks in the team of the industry leader from the Netherlands became apparent at the Dwars door Vlaanderen race. On this occasion, the management announced that top star Demi Vollering would be leaving the team for the coming season. As a result, she rolled across the finish line in a rather listless 96th place.
After the immediate denial of the Tour de France winner from 2023 the impression of many observers became more and more firmly established: the farce surrounding the contract poker between Vollering's management and her team, which had probably been smouldering for some time, had really shaken the structure of manager Danny Stam's team. With the Victories for Lorena Wiebes at Gent-Wevelgem and Lotte Kopecky at Paris-Roubaix Although the team, which had been spoilt by success, continued to make its presence felt as the spring progressed, the self-evidence of past successes seemed to have evaporated.
The US-American racing team Lidl-Trek, on the other hand, were well prepared to mercilessly exploit the staggering of their main rivals. Impressively strong across the board, the team of German sports director Ina-Yoko Teutenberg had the right answer at the ready in almost every race situation, both on the Flemish cobbles and in the hills of the Ardennes. In addition to the triumph in the Tour of Flanders, this resulted in further successes for Elisa Balsamo in the Trofeo Alfredo Binda and Bruges-De Panne and Longo Borghini at the Arrow of Brabant. With further second places at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, which was surprisingly won by the Australian Grace Brown (Team FDJ-Suez)and for Strade Bianche Longo Borghini became the dominant rider of the spring.
Spring classic: Marianne Vos impresses
And how many springs is the grande dame of international women's cycling in? Marianne Vos, multiple world champion on the road and in cyclo-cross, had to skip the entire cyclo-cross season in winter due to an operation on her pelvic artery and started her spring campaign without any racing fitness. It must have seemed like a bad joke at first Lotte Kopecky at Het Nieuwsblad and a few weeks later Lorena Wiebes at the Amstel Gold Race when they were beaten in the final sprint by the now 36-year-old Dutchwoman. At the Amstel, Vos also played out all her routine from 19 years as a pro and pushed her front wheel past the already jubilant Wiebes by just millimetres in the tiger jump.
The leader of Team Visma-Lease a Bike now has 251 victories in her bulging palmarès. The 21-year-old Puck Pieterse from Team Fenix-Deceuninck, who won the overall mountain bike world cup last year, pulled off a surprise. The Dutch U23 cross world champion from 2022 finished the spring with seven top ten results in just eight races. Wild, impetuous and aggressive - that's how you can describe the riding style of the talented all-rounder, who has only ever competed in ten UCI road races. The now 35-year-old German professional rider Romy Kasper from Team Human Powered Health has not only watched exciting races in the spring.
All eyes on the Olympics
The experienced all-rounder also notes: "You can tell that it's the Olympic season and that all the nations are looking for nominations. Everyone is more tense and the performance density has increased by a few per cent. At the end of the day, the riders are making the races faster and faster and therefore also more dangerous. Sometimes it's a matter of life and death racing into gaps where there are none. Respect for each other needs to grow again." An observation that applies equally to the men's races. The dramaturgy that can make every bike race unique, on the other hand, is told by the racers time and time again. In this respect, the women's races in spring 2024 had much more varied scripts to offer than the men's classics.
Interview with Franziska Koch: "It's time to start winning for yourself"
The German professional rider Franziska Koch was able to put herself in the limelight as an important helper for Team DSM in the spring classics. The 22-year-old from Mettmann tells TOUR how she experienced the spring classics.
TOUR: You were often to be seen in the front ranks of the peloton at the spring classics. What are your personal results?
KOCH: My role in the team is clearly defined and that is to support the captains. I'm very happy with my performance up to Roubaix. The team is now using me more and more as a helper in the finale, which automatically brings me closer to the finish line. This development shows that I have become even stronger.
What special moment from the races of the past few weeks has stuck in your memory?
At Paris-Roubaix, my front brake suddenly failed. At that moment, my team-mate Pfeiffer Georgi pulled slightly to the left directly in front of me and I couldn't brake. My handlebars got caught in her saddle, the wheels were really jammed and we had to stop. Unfortunately, that was the end of the race for me, but Pfeiffer made it back into the group and finished third in the end. I would have sunk into the ground if I had messed it up because of this incident.
You are usually deployed in the team as a strong and above all reliable helper and still have a contract with DSM-firmenich-PostNL until 2025. Your only professional victory to date dates back to 2019 at the Boels Ladies Tour. Do you have more ambitions of your own for the future?
I currently see myself as a good and valuable classics rider. But of course, I would also like to be able to sprint for victory again in the near future and move up the hierarchy towards the leading role. The team definitely sees potential in me. Despite my young age, I've been with the team for many years, so it's about time I started winning something myself (laughs).
Heavy crashes in men's races have sparked excitement and debate in the recent past. Has the willingness to take risks also changed in the women's peloton recently?
Within the teams, women are racing together more than they did a few years ago. We now see the formation of platoons. On the one hand, this makes it safer, as everyone knows their place, but on the other hand, it also makes it more dangerous, as the finding phase in the immediate final is often very chaotic. This means that more falls are inevitable. In my opinion, however, nothing has changed in terms of the willingness to take risks in the women's peloton. In my own perception, however, I'm also more of a cool rider in risky situations.
