PARIS FRANCE JULY 27 Kim Cadzow of Team New Zealand competes near to the Assemblee Nationale during the Womens Individual Time Trial on day one of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Pont Alexandre III on July 27 2024 in Paris France Photo by Jared C TiltonGetty Images
Kim Cadzow of Team New Zealand
Netherlands’ Ellen Van Dijk prepares to take the start of the women’s road cycling individual time trial
Ellen Van Dijk of the Netherlands
Elisa Longo Borghini of Italy
Demi Vollering of the Netherlands
Juliette Labous of France
Lotte Kopecky of Belgium
Diane Ingabire of Team Rwanda competes close to the Chateau de Vincennes
Audrey Cordon Ragot of France competes near to the Assemblee Nationale
Denmark’s Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig prepares to take the start of the women’s road cycling individual time trial
PARIS FRANCE JULY 27 Marta Lach of Team Poland near to the Assemblee Nationale during the Womens Individual Time Trial on day one of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Pont Alexandre III on July 27 2024 in Paris France Photo by Jared C TiltonGetty Images
Yulduz Hashimi of Team Afghanistan
Taylor Knibb of the USA
First rider to start was Slovenia’s Urska Pintar
Grace Brown of Australia races near to the Assemblee Nationale (Image credit: Getty Images)
Britain’s Anna Henderson prepares to take the start of the women’s individual time trial (Image credit: Getty Images)
Britain’s Anna Henderson races to the finish line(Image credit: Getty Images)
Christina Schweinberger of Austria competes near to the Assemblee Nationale (Image credit: Getty Images)
USA’ Chloe Dygert races past the National Assembly (Image credit: Getty Images)
In her final year as a professional cyclist, Grace Brown (Australia) stormed to the biggest win of her career to become the women’s Olympic time trial Champion in Paris, destroying the field on slippery roads with a stunning time of 39:38 and an average speed of 49kph.
Brown scorched off the start line in Les Invalides to set the fastest time at the first intermediate check, five seconds faster than World Champion Chloé Dygert (USA) and 20 quicker than eventual silver medallist Anna Henderson (Great Britain).
However, at the second time check exiting the Bois de Vincennes park, Brown had scorched through the Paris streets to extend her gap on Henderson to 51 seconds.
Disaster then struck for Dygert, who crashed just ahead of this point as the road surface changed from tarmac to cobblestones, coming down hard and losing significant time on the Australian to also come through the time check 51 seconds behind Brown.
For Brown, 32, the green time splits only got greener as she continued to charge through to the line over the Pont Alexandre III, beating Henderson’s previous best time by a stunning margin of 1:31, with Dygert still managing a medal but only bronze as she came over the line 1:32 behind Brown who was simply in a league of her own on the wet roads.
