Vos powers to impressive victory on Stage 7, Vollering stays in red

A hugely impressive performance from Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease a Bike) saw her power away from the pack on the final climb and win Stage 7 of La Vuelta Femenina, her second stage win of the week.

Vos sat in third wheel as the final 200 metres approached and struck at the perfect time to overtake Stage 4 winner Kristen Faulkner (EF Education-Cannondale) and Italian national champion Elisa Longo Borghini (Lidl-Trek). The result also meant that she made history as the first woman to win four stages of La Vuelta Femenina.

It was another majestic triumph for Vos, whose 2024 season to date has seen her win in her debut appearances at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Dwars door Vlaanderen in addition to her becoming the first woman to win Amstel Gold twice after earning her first title in 2021.

Vos all but confirmed her points classification overall victory with 190 points, an 86-point lead on SD Worx’s Blanka Vas going into the final stage.

“We really wanted to try and go for the stage win today and that’s the reason why the team controlled. Of course, when they do so much work then you want to try and make it in the final,” Vos said.

“Riejanne Markus and I were in this final break when the echelons started. That was a good situation but of course a little bit hard to control so a little bit stressful, but then when we entered the final kilometre we just tried to stay in the best possible position and go for it.

“It’s open and there’s wind so there was a possibility [of echelons]. The last days we didn’t have the wind from the right side and today it was just open and side wind so echelons again.”

Vollering lost only four seconds on her general classification lead with her fourth-place finish and will carry the red jersey into the eighth and final stage on Sunday.

Karlijn Swinkels (UAE Team ADQ) retained the Queen of the Mountains jersey for the stage and remained level on points with Vollering due to there being no points on offer in stage seven, so will most likely be looking to add as many as she can on the final day to hold on to the classification.

A seven-woman breakaway of reigning Olympic champion Anna Kiesenhofer (Roland), Quinty Schoens (VolkerWessels Women’s Pro Cycling Team), Veronica Ewers (EF Education-Cannondale), Laura Tomasi (Laboral Kutxa – Fundación Euskadi), Yuliia Biriukova (Human Powered Health), Stina Kagevi (Team Coop – Repsol), and Angela Oro (Bepink – Bongioanni) was formed early on in the race, but all but one of them was caught shortly before the start of the live coverage.

Kiesenhofer was the only rider who was able to evade the grasp of the peloton at that time, and she worked up a solo lead of around a minute.

Ana Vitória Magalhães (Bepink – Bongioanni) staged the next attack from the group in search of the Austrian rider and was soon joined by Flora Perkins (Fenix-Deceuninck), Laura Molenaar (VolkerWessels Women’s Pro Cycling Team), Anya Louw (AG Insurance – Soudal Team), Carolina Vargas (Eneicat – CMTeam), and Georgie Howe (Liv AlUla Jayco) to form a chasing group.

In the meantime, Cristina Tonetti (Laboral Kutxa – Fundación Euskadi) and Silvia Zanardi (Human Powered Health) also went clear from the bunch to go in pursuit of the breakaway ahead of them.

Kiesenhofer was absorbed by the chase group just before the 50km to go mark as Louw, who was awarded the combativity award at the end of the stage, led them to make contact.

Tonetti and Zanardi, in addition to Vargas who had been dropped, then reached the front group a kilometre later.

With the addition of the three riders, the front group created a gap of over a minute and subsequently made it to the intermediate sprint in Barahona first.

Vargas took maximum points but was then dropped again soon after, while Magalhães. Tonetti, Zanardi, Perkin, and Molenaar swept up the remaining points.

The pace was soon upped in the peloton as Visma-Lease a Bike’s Riejanne Markus led the charge. This shattered the peloton and then meant that breakaway were caught when Longo Borghini took over at the front.

The pressure from the front of the race continued, forcing groups to form as the pace at the front was increased. A dominant front group emerged as a result which featured previous 2024 La Vuelta Femenina stage winners Vos, Vollering, Évita Muzic (FDJ – SUEZ), Alison Jackson (EF Education-Cannondale), and Faulkner, as well as many of the SD Worx-Protime team (Vas, Niamh Fisher-Black, Mischa Bredewold, and Marlen Reusser).

While the front group sat a minute ahead, Kim Cadzow (EF Education-Cannondale) and Molenaar briefly went clear in search of the head of the race with 28km to go, but they were brought back two kilometres later.

With 19km to go Vollering began to initiate conversations with her SD Worx-Protime teammates, and went around the group to speak with each of them as they looked to be hatching a plan.

What followed were multiple attacks, unsurprisingly from Vollering’s teammates as Bredewold and Reusser initiated multiple moves, many from the front of the group, but none were successful at creating any distance.

A further attack followed from Lidl-Trek’s Amanda Spratt which was quickly closed down by FDJ-SUEZ’s Amber Kraak before Bredewold, Jackson, Silke Smulders (Liv AlUla Jayco), and Lily Williams (Human Powered Health) managed to create some space.

Their lead as a quartet didn’t last long as they were brought back by a big attack from Reusser. Now back together, the front group’s lead sat at around 30 seconds as they approached the final kilometre.

Jackson moved to the front to lead Faulkner into the final corner before the American took over with Longo Borghini on her wheel. The stage four winner continued as the metres ticked down, but Vos was waiting patiently in third wheel for the perfect moment to strike.

The Dutch powerhouse launched her attack within the final 150 metres to create clear distance to secure her 253rd career victory, just days after her 252nd on stage three.

Two seconds later Faulkner took second followed by Longo Borghini in third. Vollering finished in fourth, followed by Ingvild Gåskjenn (Liv AlUla Jayco), Fisher-Black, Markus, Muzic, Pauliena Rooijakkers (Fenix-Deceuninck), and Eline Jansen (VolkerWessels Women’s Pro Cycling Team).

The final stage of La Vuelta Femenina awaits with the third mountain stage covering 89.5km and featuring two category one climbs, the final of which will be the summit finish at the Valdesquí ski station where the general classification champion will be crowned. After finishing the 2023 edition second in all three categories, Tour de France Femmes 2023 winner Vollering will be keen to add her name to the list of champions which has been dominated by Annemiek van Vleuten since 2021.