At the press conference after the final stage and podium ceremony of the Giro d'Italia Femminile, race winner Annemiek van Vleuten (Mitchelton-Scott) touched upon a number of topics within women's cycling.
Van Vleuten put her dominant win down to a strong team and a good preparation. "I do not think I was ever in trouble. It was also thanks to my team, it was a really strong and experienced team at this Giro, so I was never in trouble. Uphill, I had to do it by myself, but also had Amanda Spratt with me who was really strong. I think I was never in trouble on the climbs. Last year I was good, but this year I was a little bit better uphill than I was last year."
With three stage wins and a huge gap on the other general classification contenders, van Vleuten has already been nicknamed 'the Cannibal' in an homage to Eddy Merckx. The Dutchwoman herself thought this moniker should apply not only to herself.
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"I think it could suit our whole team! We won six stages. I myself won three of them and won overall with a big time difference, so yeah, maybe it applies to me."
Asked about how the Giro Rosa could improve further, van Vleuten pointed to the lack of TV coverage. While the amount of daily highlights was an improvement over previous years, she opined that cycling fans hungered for more.
"I know that a lot of people would really like to watch it live, especially during some boring Tour de France stages. It would be really cool if we could have live coverage of this race. A lot of people are asking for it. But I also think it was really good that we had TV coverage this year, that is an important step."
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