Giro d’Italia Donne: Antonia Niedermaier holds off Annemiek van Vleuten to win stage 5

Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM) claimed a sensational first Women’s WorldTour victory on stage 5 of the Giro d’Italia Donne, holding off race leader Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar) in a nail-biting pursuit at the end of a dramatic Queen stage.

The 20-year-old German attacked from an elite nine-rider group on the second of three climbs on the 105.7km route, before soloing in from 25km out.

Van Vleuten, who’d ripped the race to pieces on the major early ascent of the Passo del Lupo, dropped key rival Elisa Longo Borghini (Lidl-Trek) at the top of the final climb to launch her solo pursuit but Niedermaier held firm on the descent and the final haul to the line in Ceres.

Van Vleuten was slowed by a small crash as she overcooked a corner on that descent, and she’ll wonder if that may have been the difference as she crossed the line for second place just eight seconds down. Still, she wasn’t able to make any real inroads on the final 4km uncategorised drag, and heartily congratulated her younger rival - half her age - beyond the line.

Despite having to settle for her second top-three finish in as many days, Van Vleuten strengthened her grip on the pink jersey, although the size of her lead - and the whole complexion of this race - was skewed by a nasty crash for Longo Borghini. The Italian also overcooked a corner coming off the final climb a few seconds in arrears, but fell at much higher speed, flipping over the grass banking at the side of the road.

Fortunately, she was able to remount and finish the stage but, rolling home several minutes down, is now out of overall contention. 

Lidl-Trek do have another rider in the mix, with Gaia Realini finishing just behind a four-woman chase group that contested the final podium spot. Niamh Fisher-Black (SD Worx) claimed it, ahead of Juliette Labous (dsm-firmenich) and Veronica Ewers (EF Education-TIBCO-SVB).

“I’m really overwhelmed, because it’s my first Giro Donne, I’m so young, I cannot realise it now. I’m really really happy about it,” said Niedermaier.

“I don’t even realise it, I was just pushing and trying to attack. Until the end I was like ‘can I do it? I don’t know, but at the finish I realised I did it, it was a great feeling.”

Niedermaier moved up to second overall, with Van Vleuten now enjoying a lead of some 2:07. Ewers is third at 2:18, with Labous fourth at 3:00 and Realini fifth at 3:14.

“I have the pink jersey stronger on my shoulders, so we achieved the goal,” said Van Vleuten. “In the end I was also fighting for the stage. We put on a show and to make it even more exciting I took a little bit too much risk in the final descent. Nothing bad, but I couldn’t take her [Niedermaier] back anymore but the important thing was I took time on GC."

A fast and furious queen stage

The Queen stage of the Giro took riders over the fearsome Passo del Lupo (10.1km at 8.4%) within the first 30km of the 105.7km stage in the Piedmont mountains, before two much gentler climbs - Vietti (12.6km at 3.5%) and Sant’Ignazio - 6.1km at 6.6% - in the final 40km.

It was a blistering start and the peloton shattered as soon as they hit the Lupo. In shades of her immediate attack on the Queen stage of last year’s Tour de France Femmes, Van Vleuten went hard from the bottom, and left the race in ruins behind her. This time, however, she was not alone. Gaia Realini, a thorn in her side on a similar stage of the Vuelta last month, was the only rider able to live with the pace by the summit.

Longo Borghini was next over the top alongside Fisher-Black, and the duo eventually worked their way back to the leaders after the long descent. Behind them, Niedermaier was part of a five-rider group with Labous, Marta Cavalli (FDJ-SUEZ) and the UAE Team ADQ duo of Siliva Persico and Erica Magnaldi. More than three minutes further back was the first sizeable group, containing the likes of Ewers and Mavi García (Liv Racing TeqFind), Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig (FDJ-SUEZ), and Fem van Empel (Jumbo-Visma).

After a rolling section of the course, the first chasing group came back to the four leaders ahead of the Vietti climb with 35km to go. That newly expanded lead group of nine proved unruly, however, and the larger chase group steadily made inroads as the frontrunners attacked each other instead of working together.

Van Vleuten was among those to attack on the Vietti climb, but it was the flatter section near the top where it really opened up, as Persico set off followed by Labous. Soon after, Niedermaier came flying across with Fisher-Black in her wheel, and she went straight through to catapult off the front. As it turned out, it was the winning move.

Fisher-Black gave chase over the summit but was caught with 18km to go, just before the larger chase group made it across to the pink jersey group to form one main group behind the lone leader, the indecision taking the gap out to the one minute mark.

It was straight onto the final climb at Sant’Ignazio, where that group exploded once more. Van Vleuten issued an acceleration before following an even more vicious one from Longo Borghini, and the pair were away. By the top, they’d reduced the gap to Niedermaier to just 15 seconds, and Van Vleuten sprinted over the crest to start the descent alone.

There was more drama on the descent as Van Vleuten and Longo Borghini both overcooked the same left-hand bend, the former riding onto the grass and stumbling over seconds before the latter went flying off the road. Up ahead, Niedermaier herself nearly went into a set of barriers, but kept it upright to hit the base and start the final 4km drag with a lead of 20 seconds.

She conceded half of that lead in the space of 1500 metres and it seemed that Van Vleuten would hunt her down, but that was as close as it got, as the youngster dug into her last reserves for a huge milestone victory.