Results European Championships 2026 women's under-23 road race - Shock victory for Mara Winter ahead of Dutch duo and World Champion Chladonová
Cycling
The 2026 Ljubljana European Championships have begun officially and the women's under-23 road race was the first event held this Friday. The victory has been taken by Switzerland's Mara Winter, beating a duo of Dutch rider and world champion Chladonová to take the biggest win of her career.
The very first event of the 2026 Europeans began in Sencur and featured an 88-kilometer long race, consisting of four full laps of the circuit that will be featured over the coming days. Four ascensions of the climb to Mozjanca, just over 2 kilometers long at 10%.
In the final ascent Niemke Vinke attacked, followed by the rainbow jersey Viktória Chladonová. Megan Arens of the Netherlands and Mara Winter connected with the duo shortly after.
The Dutch majority in the quartet hinted at a likely tactical finale, but the hard chase of a separate group of five riders close by meant that the pace couldn't stop up front at risk of getting caught.
The four riders went into the final kilometers together, and Winter was the first to launch her sprint, early on in a relatively technical finalle. The effort appeared to have come too early, but the Swiss rider showed incredible sprint and held out the front of the group all the way to the finish line.
Winter, 20, had finished fourth at the World Championships last weekend and has now taken a breakthrough victory in Slovenia. Niemke Vinke finished second and world champion Viktória Chladonová rode to third on the day.
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Results European Championships women's under-23 road race
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- Where does it say that? That is your biased opinion which just goes to show how biased our general education towards such subjects is. Instead of commenting on the inaccuracies of the comment, why don’t you question the oversight, lack of detail or precision of the article? Why is women’s sport almost always systematically ignored in a non gendered article on sport?Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- Assuming at some point (unlike the Horners and Gianettis who had their peaks after they should have retired) TP will tire out, it will be very interesting to see how UAE evolve. A demise like Sky maybe?Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- You’re « back »?Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- If they have such advanced training strategies no other team can match, how do they keep it secret, how do they deal with people getting paid to leak info or riders switching teams?.Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- Best go check you’re not at the bottom of that list now Nils, friends is a very precarious term in some circles.Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- Alternatively, just raise (or let it rise and pretend you’re powerless to stop it) the price of oil a bit more and turn him into a pacemaker ;-)Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- They managed something the Dutch ladies never did but at least they were smart enough to stop trying ;-)Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- Can you elaborate? I’ve always wondered what the exact or expected skills required of a sports director are and why there are so few candidates available that teams have to wait for riders to retire. Comparing with other sports, F1 teams are rarely directed by ex-pilots and in football, there’s usually quite a gap between playing and coaching top level teams.Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- I kind of doubt he was going to spend his time ON the table and kudos to him for what he did BUT I thought the whole reason behind it was to pick up the easy points on offer, in which case he failed, no? In any case, he may not have raced since a while but judging by the result, he was obviously staying very active.Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
- Well explained. Slovenia’s current success didn’t come about because of TP and he wasn’t the product of a program, it was more conjuctural. Each country is different but of course if someone remarkable appears somewhere unexpected, you can be sure people will look at the well a bit closer. I’m guessing TP has gotten a lot of kids to try cycling (not only in Slovenia) and some structure has probably grown to channel that but I’m not sure anyone really notable will spring from that, even traditional countries can’t guarantee a steady supply of stars, let alone superstars, cycling just isn’t a big enough sport for the numbers and money to ensure consistency. With Sagan, maybe those wishing to emulate him didn’t quite understand what was involved, he made things look fun and cool and many of those interested by that projection might have gotten disillusioned once they realised the sweat involved.Jumpyjohn02-10-2026
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