Alé BTC Ljubljana starts the adventure as best it could at the Tour de l’Ardeche, an international 2.1 race divided into seven stages, scheduled in France from 3 to 9 September. Great victory for Mavi Garcia who wins in her debut with the Spanish national champion’s jersey in the first stage of 90.3 km from Santi-Martin-d’Ardeche to Bourg-Saint-Andeol.
The strong Iberian rider – recently winner of both the national time trial and road race title – today performed another splendid solo action in the last thirty kilometres of the race. She attacked and there was nothing more for her opponents to do. Second to 7 seconds came the French Audrey Cordon-Ragot (Trek-Segafredo Women) and third the Spanish Alicia Gonzalez (Movistar Team). Tenth place for the Slovenian Ursa Pintar to complete the excellent italian team performance.
Sport director Giuseppe Lanzoni tells us: “With the girls we decided to forcing on the first category climb with 30 kilometres to go. Mavi had to start first and then Ursa Pintar had to move on. Mavi attacked, but it went really strong and they never picked her up again. We are happy because she showed once again that she is in excellent condition and we look forward to the future with confidence”.
With today’s victory, of course, Mavi Garcia is also the first leader of the general classification of the French race. The Spaniard also wore the mountain classification leader’s jersey, while Dutchman Maaike Boogard took the jersey as most aggressive rider.
But that’s not all. Good news for the Alé BTC Ljubliana also came from Turkey where, in the morning, the Russian Anastasiia Chursina took second place in the
(ph. Tornanti.cc)
