"I thought I was in quite an ok position with Wiebes and Vollering" - Puck Pieterse escapes the big crash with abrasions but without major time loss

Stage 5 of Tour de France Femmes was quite surprisingly won by SD Worx - Protime rider Blanka Kata Vas. At the same time her teammate Demi Vollering was fighting hard to reduce her time loss following a crash in final kilometers. Puck Pieterse was involved in the crash too, but unlike Vollering she managed to finish in the peloton and thus stays on the virtual podium.

"The whole day was quite hectic actually. We tried to be in the break but it didn’t work and they kept attacking, especially at the beginning. I was quite surprised that everyone mostly stayed upright in the beginning, I didn’t see any crashes actually," Pieterse confided her surprise after the stage.

"We came quite fast into the final. With 10km to go I tried to set the tempo to catch the leaders and maybe finish it off on the finish climb but there was a roundabout that had a really tight corner afterwards and I think nobody really expected it. It was just a big crash. I thought I was in quite an ok position, I was with Wiebes and Vollering but there it was too far backwards to not crash. So now I have some extra nice red things [abrasions] to add to my polka dot jersey."

The Fenix-Deceuninck rider was overtaken by Katarzyna Niewiadoma and Kristen Faulkner for the GC lead, however the 22-year-old multi-talent remains in the lead of both mountain and youth classifications. In addition, her bid for general classification is still as strong as ever with only 22 seconds of disadvantage to new yellow jersey Niewiadoma.