Lorena Wiebes (SD Worx-Protime) scorched to a sprint victory on stage 5 of the Giro d'Italia Women, beating Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Liane Lippert (Movistar) in a reduced front group for her second victory of the 2025. race.
53km from the finish, UAE Team ADQ and SD Worx-Protime went all-out when the race turned into crosswinds, and a group of 15 riders tore itself free from the peloton.
Both teams were represented with five riders each and kept going all the way to the finish, crossing the line 1:40 minutes ahead of the main peloton.
Marlen Reusser (Movistar) was also part of the front echelon and kept the maglia rosa, while Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime) and Katrin Aalerud (Uno-X Mobility) were amongst those making gains overall.
"The whole team did really well. First, we controlled the breakaway with the team, and then we put the race in the gutter a bit together with UAE Team ADQ. The peloton broke, because and we were there with a lot of girls, that was really good.
"We had to finish it off, and the girls did amazing again, with Barbara [Guarischi] and Lotte [Kopecky] as lead-out, it's really great to have them," Wiebes thanked her teammates after her second stage victory within three days.
"It's also important for the GC for Anna. It's nice that we could make this move, so we can be really happy with today and look forward to the next days," finished Wiebes.
How it unfolded
Covering 120km from Mirano to Monselice, the stage was almost completely flat, with only the short climb to Arquà Petrarca on the finishing circuit offering a topographic difficulty. And with low wind speeds, most riders did not expect echelon action.
The early breakaway that formed after 8km included Franzi Brauße (Ceratizit), Katia Ragusa (Human Powered Health), Asia Zontone (Isolmant-Premac-Vittoria), and the Top Girls Fassa Bortolo duo of Alice Bulegato and Sara Luccon.
They were 3:10 minutes ahead at the intermediate sprint in Mira with 83km to go, but the peloton then kept the gap below three minutes in preparation for a sprint finish.
However, when the route took a right turn to head west-northwest towards Monselice, UAE Team ADQ and SD Worx-Protime put the pressure on. Although the wind speeds were only around 10km/h, the peloton soon split into several groups. While most of those groups quickly came back together, the front echelon kept going and steadily increased its advantage.
UAE Team ADQ were represented with Longo Borghini, Alena Amialiusik, Brodie Chapman, Eleonora Gasparrini, and Silvia Persico while SD Worx-Protime had Lotte Kopecky, Elena Cecchini, Barbara Guarischi, Van der Breggen, and Wiebes in the group. Reusser was accompanied by Lippert, Vos had Rosita Reijnhout with her, and Aalerud had also made it into the group.
Up front, Brauße left her companions behind as she tried to keep the breakaway going, but with 45km to go, all five former escapees had been absorbed by the echelon-turned-front-group.
Although Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto, Fenix-Deceuninck, and Lidl-Trek led the chase in the peloton, the gap became bigger and bigger, and when they crossed the finish line in Monselice with 28.4km to go to start the first of two laps around the Colli Euganei, the peloton was 1:11 minutes behind.
The gap was only seven seconds bigger with 14.2km to go, but the relentless yet unsuccessful chase had tired the riders in the peloton, and they lost more time in the final.
Up front, Wiebes was expertly led out by her teammates Guarischi and Kopecky, and Vos never attempted to come out of her slipstream, settling for second place, while Lippert edged out Kopecky for third.
Results
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