Puck Pieterse, the 22-year-old Dutch cyclist, recently voiced her ambitions for the upcoming Tour de France Femmes. Initially, she humorously announced that she intended to ride a “leisurely tour through the Netherlands, Belgium, and France, finishing at Alpe d’Huez”. However, in an interview with the event’s organisers, she revealed her serious intentions for the race.
Pieterse’s participation was only confirmed recently, but the seven-day event had been on her radar for some time. “During the winter, we always plan the calendar. I didn’t immediately think about riding the Tour. It was more like, we’ll plan up to the Olympics and then decide. In my TrainingPeaks, I had a question mark next to the Tour with a funny emoticon. It was more of a tease than a real plan.”
The start in Rotterdam and the fact that four of the eight stages have a Dutch touch definitely played a role in her decision. “I thought, if my preparation and form are good, why not? I had some bad luck during the Olympics, which I need to process emotionally, but it’s not like I broke five arms. I don’t need a hard comeback. There’s little time for self-pity, as two weeks after the Tour, the World Mountain Bike Championships are already on the horizon. I think I’ll only start the mental recovery process after that.”
Within her Fenix-Deceuninck team, the main focus will be on Yara Kastelijn and Pauliena Rooijakkers. “I will probably have a free role. It would be great to compete at the front in the tougher stages. I don’t have the pressure to aim for the yellow jersey, for instance. If I lose half an hour in the first stage, it doesn’t really matter. I can set other goals then. The good thing is that there’s no pressure. But if I were to aim for something, it would be the youth classification.”
The Tour de France Femmes starts on 12th August in Rotterdam, just two weeks after Pieterse experienced a major disappointment in her still very early career. She was on track for a podium finish in mountain biking at the Paris Olympics, with a silver medal in sight, but a flat tyre in the final lap caused her to lose too much time to secure a medal.
