The 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro were a major event in Annemiek van Vleuten’s career. While many will remember the horrible images as Van Vleuten (Mitchelton-Scott) crashed during the road race, it was the performance prior to it, on what looked to be a race-winning move, that has spurred the Dutchwoman on to become a serious stage race contender in the past 18 months.
Her ride in Rio led her team to tell her that she should consider testing herself out as a general classification rider. After letting the thought sink in, Van Vleuten tested herself at the 2017 Giro Rosa and enjoyed a career-best finish of third overall. Buoyed by the performance, she has set her sights a few steps higher this year.
“I am aiming for overall victory,” Van Vleuten told Cyclingnews after returning from an altitude training camp in Tenerife. “I think that I’m riding really well. I feel really good and I think I am going better than last year.
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“After the Olympics, my team said you can climb really well, maybe you should go for the GC at the Giro. It took me half a year to process that thought because I really like to race one-day races a bit more. [Stage races] are stressful and you have to ride in a defensive way, which is not what I really prefer, but I really like new challenges. It is a beautiful goal in my season.
"I came very close, with third in the end. I was very proud of that and that made me start to believe that I could maybe win it."
Going from one-day racer to GC hunter has been something of a learning curve as Van Vleuten learns to temper her more aggressive approach to racing. Despite the strong result, there were some harsh lessons to learn too, namely that there is no day off when you’re targeting the overall classification. Van Vleuten was in a strong position after the first three stages, but she missed the cut when crosswinds hit on day four and lost more than two minutes to the other contenders.
The road to Innsbruck
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest Interviews and Features http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/giro-rosa-countdown-i-am-aiming-for-giro-rosa-victory-says-van-vleuten
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