After impressive performances in the Tour de France Femmes where she finished 2nd overall, World Champion Lotte Kopecky won the UAE Tour Queen stage on Jebel Hafeet against strong climbers like Gaia Realini, Mavi Garcia and Neve Bradbury.
After dominating on Jebel Hafeet in the 2023 edition, Gaia Realini was the favourite to win in 2024. Lidl-Trek also sent to the UAE Tour the Italian champion, Elisa Longo Borghini, who finished first on Jebel Hafeet last year after the team decided she woul win over Realini. As the stage this year was flat and without crosswinds, this was a pure w/kg test for the riders.
Right before the climb started Petra Stiasny crashed in the peloton. The Fenix-Deceuninck pure climber lost a chance to battle for Top 10 but in the end finished 17th. Wiebes did fantastic work at the bottom of the climb, riding full gas and dropping most of the riders out of the peloton, repaying Kopecky for her brilliant leadouts of the previous two stages. After Wiebes finished her turn, Canyon//SRAM Racing took over for a brief moment until Gaia Realini increased the pace at the front, despite her teammate Longo Borghini being in the peloton. With 7 km to go, there were left only six riders in the group and Gladys Verhulst-Wild was caught as the last survivor from the breakaway.
Lidl-Trek tactics was not their best as clearly Realini is a stronger climber than Longo Borghini and, as the last 2.5 kilometres of Jebel Hafeet are shallow, it would make sense for Longo Borghini to sacrifice her chances and pace at the front of the group early. After Realini stopped setting her tempo, surprisingly Spanish champion Mavi Garcia started riding in the wind. Garcia was happy to ride at her pace in the wind for more than 10 minutes of the climb even after Realini attacked again and dropped her teammate Longo Borghini.
Before the shallow final kilometres, 2020 Zwift Academy winner Neve Bradbury made a powerful attack, distancing Garcia, Kopecky and Realini. Unfortunately for the Australian, Kopecky was strong enough to come back in the final kilometres on a 5% section and distance her at the end of the climb with a strong sprint. Kopecky can perform on unipuerto stages and she became the GC leader before the final sprint day.
Results powered by FirstCycling.com
Kopecky and Bradbury did Jebel Hafeet in 32:28 min, pushing 5.10 ᵉW/Kg. Garcia lost 32 seconds but did almost the same effort with 5.09 ᵉW/Kg due to pacing in the wind for such a long time. In the 2023 edition, Realini climbed Jebel Hafeet in 33:48 min and in 2024 did it 37 seconds faster. 19-year-old Marion Bunel from St Michel – Mavic – Auber93 finished 5th. The young Frenchwoman performed well in Tour Down Under and upped her level in the UAE Tour. Very likely a World Tour team will sign her for 2025 as she is one of the most promising teenage climbers in cycling.
would it be possible to sometime do an article with what w/kg numbers are outstanding in the women’s peloton?
Maybe also in comparison to the mens numbers. This would be very helpful, since most of the time, mens numbers are floating around from hearing them a lot more, and then women’s numbers get be compared to those.
Hope you’ll get around to doing such an article.
But nonetheless grateful for you giving womens cycling the attention it deserves.
so good to put NUMBERS to this.
As great as these women’s numbers are,
it also puts in perspective the difference with men.
The best women perform like good amateur men.