Spratt Takes Over Women's Tour Down Under Lead

13 January 2018 06:13
Amanda Spratt has won the third stage of the Women’s Santos Tour Down Under.

Stage three was a 122km stage from Tailem Bend to the German enclave of Hahndorf and had Katrin Garfoot of Uni SA in the leader’s ochre jersey with a lead of four seconds. 

There were eighty-four riders who started a stage in strong head winds and the peloton soon split into three groups but after eighteen kilometres, the thirty or so riders in the front group sat up and allowed the rest to catch up. 

Just before Murray Bridge and after 36.1kms, there was a crash which saw Briana Hargreave hitting the deck.

Over the bridge and Margot Clyne was on the front of the peloton trying to get clear. Her move failed as the speed of the peloton increased to 42kph.

With fifty kilometres gone, Linda Vilumsen of Team New Zealand got away and soon had a lead of five minutes.

UniSA tried to close her down but a small group, which race leader Katrin Garfoot missed out on, decided they would do a better job and started the chase

Amanda Spratt of Mitchelton Scott and Lauren Stephens (Cylance) came out of that group and were able to catch Vilumsen who was still 1.45 ahead.

They dropped the leader and the pair battled it out with Amanda Spratt first over the line to take the win and the overall lead in the race.

A delighted Amanda Spratt said to her team’s press office: The team were just amazing. Linda Villumsen got out there and got that big gap and we didn’t panic, actually Annemiek was there and she really calmed me down because I was stressing.

“UniSA started to panic and they started to send riders up the road and we actually got in an ideal move with Annemiek and Lucy in there with Kat behind. Kat panicked and had to do some work. I sat on her and as soon as she caught the group, I attacked straight away.

“I knew it was the perfect moment. We did exactly what we wanted, we isolated Kat, and I could capitalise off that.

“I was feeling very strong but you can never underestimate Lauren Stevens, she is a strong rider, I have had some battles with her in Europe over the years. I knew she would be strong, but this was my biggest goal of January, the Tour Down Under. I came in December and looked at all of the courses so I really targeted this stage because I knew it suited me. I knew the finish climb would hurt like hell, but I was ready.

“It’s so exciting and I’m still a little bit in shock (about taking the race lead). I’m so grateful to the team for giving me the opportunity, it could have been any of the three of us that were up there on general classification so I am just so happy I could do it for the team.”


 

KEV MONKS FOR DIGITAL SPORTS GROUP 

Source: DSG