Thüringen Ladies Tour 2023 Race Preview

Fenix-Deceuninck will have a good shot at sprint wins with the combination of Julie de Wilde and Maria Martins. De Wilde will be the better option on the lumpier stages but Maria Martins can come into her own on the flatter ones. One thing to just note about De Wilde though is that it’s her first race since the big crash at Brugge-De Panne so she may not be at peak form yet. Maria Martins has finished 5th twice this weekend, which goes with her 5th at Ronde de Mouscron earlier in the season. She was in a similar ballpark with 4th places at Bretagne Ladies Tour too and can repeat that here.

Femke Gerritse did a good race at Festival Elsy Jacobs finishing 4th in GC there. She was on the podium at last year’s Thüringen Ladies Tour and there’s a chance she can match that this year. It was her consistency across all of the stages that took her to that position and we’ve seen that’s possible again. Teammate Lieke Nooijen might get a go in the sprints, which we’ve seen with 3rd at Leiedal Koerse and 5th at Le Samyn des Dames. She was quiet here last year but should be a contender in the finishes.

I thought Ruby Roseman-Gannon was going to be a major contender here last year but the team ended up playing the Manly card and that pushed Roseman-Gannon down the order a bit. She’s a strong rider on these lumpy stages and certainly has a sprint kick too. She was 5th back at Dwars door Vlaanderen and her 4th in GC back at the Tour Down Under is possible again here. Teammate Georgia Baker won a stage here last year but this is her first race since the final day of the UAE Tour back in mid-February. I’ve been wrong about picking the Jayco rider at this race before but surely this time Roseman-Gannon is their main rider.

SD Worx aren’t bringing their biggest stars but we know they’ve got plenty in depth. I’m backing Christine Majerus to lead the team’s GC hopes as she hunts for more points for Luxembourg going into the Worlds and the Olympics. She was 9th at Festival Elsy Jacobs where, unfortunately for her, some quicker sprinters dominated the endings. The team should do well enough in the team time trial to give her a good GC start. There’s going to be a dart throw about which rider will be sprinting. It could be Lonneke Ueneken or Femke Markus or Barbara Guarischi. Uneken has a best result of 11th at Ronde van Drenthe, Markus was 19th at Paris Roubaix Femmes after hitting the deck in the finish and Guarischi’s best result of the year is 20th at Veenendaal Veenendaal. 

All of which makes it hard to pinpoint a single option. Looks like it’ll actually be Lorena Wiebes going for the sprints here, which changes things quite a bit! She confirmed in her post-Vuelta Burgos interview that she was going to have a quick turnaround and head to Thüringen this week. That probably means we’re looking at multiple stage wins and a GC battle. There’s now also Lotte Kopecky on the start list for SD Worx, which if anything makes them more likely to secure the GC win. Kopecky has been in strong climbing, sprinting and attacking form this year. With only 5 riders on the team, she might lose a bit of time on the TTT but she’s going to make it up no problem for a GC win.

As usual, the Top Girls Fassa Bortolo pair of Cristina Tonetti and Alessia Vigiliaget a mention here. Tonetti has a number of top-10s at GP della Liberazione PINK, Trofeo Ponente, La Classique Morbihan and Trofeo Oro. She should be a contender but her teammate Vigilia seems to have the best recent form. 4th at Durango Durango, 3rd in GC at the Bretagne Ladies Tour and 2nd at La Classique Morbihan are all great results. The TTT will make things tough but the pair will be stage contenders once more.