Stage 4 of the Tour de Suisse Women provided a breathtaking finale to the alpine stage race as just four riders broke free from a front group of 13 with a dozen kilometres remaining in the 127.5km route. The Elisa Longo Borghini (Lidl-Trek) neutralised multiple attacks by the Canyon-SRAM duo of Kasia Niewiadoma and Neve Bradbury across the final 10km and tried to anticipate a last effort in the sprint in Champagne.
A final spark from the Italian Champion would fall short to Demi Vollering (SD Worx-Protime), who won her third stage in four days and the overall title.
“I left my lungs on the road out there. Maybe some farmer can pick them up and give them back to me,” joked Longo Borghini in the post-stage interview.
Her Lidl-Trek team had raced aggressively, setting a hard pace from the first climb of the day and then sending Brodie Chapman into a strong breakaway. On the final climb, the team sacrificed Gaia Realini to set up Longo Borghini’s attack.
“We really wanted a hard race, and then it was a little bit of a poker game when the breakaway went. But we were confident in Brodie because she was virtually in the third spot, so we just let her go,” Longo Borghini explained.
“When SD Worx-Protime started chasing, we decided to go full on the last climb with a full lead-out from Gaia for me. I still had Brodie up the road, and she did an amazing job bridging back to the breakaway.”
The 32-year-old did everything she could to keep the front group of four together for a sprint but was passed by Vollering with 200 metres to go. For a second time at the Tour de Suisse, Longo Borghini would finish as runner-up to Vollering on a stage, also placing second in the time trial.
As Bradbury finished third on the day, Longo Borghini didn’t pass the young Australian in the general classification, finishing the race in third place overall. Nonetheless, she was full of praise for her teammates for executing the plan for the day.
“In the final, it was just a roulette, it was hard to keep it together, and Demi was the strongest in the sprint. But big credit to my team because we really raced super well. My teammates were really on top of it, thank you very much to them, it was a really good team display,” Longo Borghini said.
