19-year-old Marion Bunel dominated in one of the hardest climbing races in the women’s calender, beating Evita Muzic and Julie Bego on the mighty Chamrousse climb.
Evita Muzic after her performance in La Vuelta Femenina and Vuelta a Burgos against Demi Vollering was the big favourite to win Alpes Gresivaudan Classic. She won the first two editions of the race in 2022 and 2023. Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig, Marion Bunel and Julie Bego were some of the other strong climbers on the start list. Chamrousse (18.3 km, 6.1%) is a un unusually long climb in women’s cycling and would be a perfect test for pure climbers as most of the climbs in the WorldTour calendar are below 12 minutes long. This side of Chamrousse was not as steep as the more popular side used in the 2001 and 2014 Tour de France, but still it was hard enough to make huge gaps.
The race until the final climb was already extremely exhausting for the riders in the peloton. Evita Muzic spent 1,989 kilojoules in 3:00h, which is 13.46 kj/kg/h. It is a very intensive day for women’s cycling.
With 12.8 km to go Cofidis 19-year-old climber Julie Bego made a big move on the steep section of the climb. Bunel and Cavallar followed her, with Muzic later bridging to the leading group. With 9 km to go Bunel attacked and no one responded immediately from Muzic, Bego and Cavallar.
Bunel performed well in the Alicante training camp in the winter and later finished 5th on the Jebel Hafeet stage in the UAE Tour. The lightweight French climber benefited from the hard climbing course in Alpes Gresivaudan Classic and blew away her competition with a strong performance.
Bunel averaged 4.62 ᵉW/Kg for 54:15 min on Chamrousse from Saint-Martin-d’Uriage. There have not been many long climbs in women’s races, but it is definitely a great effort at age 19 after three hours in the peloton. An even steeper climb would have benefited her even more. Muzic and Bego lost 1:38 and 1:40 min, pushing 4.40 ᵉW/Kg.
Love the women’s content!! Hope they can continue to get bigger climbs in the future!!