Classic Brugge-De Panne: Elisa Balsamo wins women's race outsprinting Charlotte Kool
CyclingThursday, 21 March 2024 at 17:12
Elisa Balsamo has really gotten back to her best form and has continued her winning run at the Classic Brugge-De Panne. The Lidl-Trek sprinter was the fastest at the end of the very fast day of racing.
The pan-flat race was one for the sprinters. With no wind present it would be very difficult for attacks to succeed, but still some quality riders attempted to surprise the peloton. Nina Buijsman was the last attacker getting caught with 9 kilometers to go.
Christina Schweinberger made a move with 4 kilometers to go but it was short-lived. Team DSM-Firmenich PostNL had a textbook leadout into the finish leading out Charlotte Kool perfectly, however in the final sprint Elisa Balsamo was the fastest by a long margin. Kool and Daria Pikulik completed the podium.
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- This is pretty much a low bar for a star rider. Domestiques from other teams got higher GC rankings than him. Either he has to really train for those 1 hour climb or give up on GC hope altogether. Not a fan of Pidcock, but I think he's definitely capable of doing better if he really trained for long climbs, which his coach said he didn't. Best of luck to him.
KerisVroom05-06-2025 - Nuh, realistically, Jonas is the only main rival unless some accidents befall Tadej.KerisVroom05-06-2025
- I just simply don't believe team orders were at fault. In what world would a pink jersey leader knowingly throw away their lead just to follow team orders? Del Toro surely knew the gap to Yates was growing and he was going to lose his lead. So either Del Toro didn't have the legs or he was stupid and listened to alleged team orders to only follow Carapaz. It simply does not make sense - I mean even if the team orders were true, Del Toro shouldn't take it literally e.g. if Carapaz crashed and all the other top ten riders went 3mins up the road, would Del Toro really be stupid enough to "follow team orders" and stick with Carapaz? This is an exaggerated example, but it is exactly what Del Toro did with Yates. Del Toro only has himself to blame - if someone is threatening your lead, you chase, it shouldn't take team orders to tell you to do that!Pogboom05-06-2025
- Chris Froome...who cares yet he gets top billing here!frieders305-06-2025
- "The idea was we’d race to win every day – or every day that suited me – and do the best GC I could." It was supposed to be "either or", not "and". The dreams of GC glory are confounded by the lack of recovery. He should have stuck to stage wins.abstractengineer04-06-2025
- There are three GT winners in that group and all different onesabstractengineer04-06-2025
- Nobody, it aint the TDFabstractengineer04-06-2025
- RIP Mustafa Ayyorkun.
santiagobenites04-06-2025 - From what I can gather, seems the DS had drilled into Del Toro before the race and again at the start of the long climb that he must mark Carapaz. Imperfect info made it difficult for the DS to directly tell Del Toro to close on Yates before the end of the climb, so it was mostly left to Del Toro's unexperienced judgement, who may have been near his limit anyways. In the end, probably either one could have lead the chase, but then would have come in third, while helping the other to first. Great execution of a great plan by Visma in Wout getting on top of the climb in advance and Yates being able to get that separation that caused the stalemate behind him. Also, in hindsight, big mistake by both EF and UAE in letting the break and Wout get so far out.Meeper04-06-2025
- Don't think Carapaz and Del Toro could have reeled him back in once Yates got to Wout; too big of an engine. The lead would have been stretched long enough to prevent them from closing the gap at the end.Meeper04-06-2025