In a thrilling finale, Team SD Works team-mates Demi Vollering and Lotte Kopecky caught the lone leader Kristen Faulkner of Team Jayco-AlUla with 600 metres to go. The Dutch and the Belgian rode flat out to the finish. Defending champion Kopecky took the last curve in first position but Vollering overhauled her at the eleventh hour in a very tight finish to take her first Strade Bianche Women Elite Crédit Agricole title, making it five victories for The Netherlands out of nine editions of the event following the successes of her current coach Anna van der Breggen (2018), Annemiek van Vleuten (2019, 2020) and Chantal Van den Broek-Blaak (2021).
Demi Vollering, the winner of the Strade Bianche Women Elite Crédit Agricole, said in the press conference: “I spoke with Lotte [Kopecky] in the tent before the podium ceremony and she was very happy. It was immediately good between us. There are no hard feelings. But we’re killers. It was cool to finish like this. It’s been a nice finale, also for people who watched it from home. But the first feeling after the finish was being a bit confused. We didn’t know which one of us had won so we were wondering if we could celebrate. Of course we could, because as long as it’s the team winning, it’s good and it was double good. I felt strong today. I was really confident that we’d catch Kirsten Faulkner. I knew we’d be stronger than her in the last climb”.
