As she did the year before, Mylène de Zoete (Serratigit-WNT) won the opening stage of the Tour of Chongmin, defeating Tereza Neumanova (UAE Team ADQ) in a group sprint. After her teammate Marta Lach attacked in the closing stages, de Zoete continued to steer Neumanova, who eventually finished second.
“I lost the girls before the last corner and it was chaos as usual. Then I saw Marta attacking up front and I thought, 'Okay, that's good,'” de Zoete told Cycling News.
“I was in a pretty good position up front, so I just followed the wheel in front of me. I caught Marta in the last 300 meters and then I started sprinting.”
Early in the race, Serratizit-WNT had great success in the two intermediate sprints of the day, but instead of collecting bonus seconds for just one rider, de Zoete, Rach, and Katrin Schweinberger earned time bonuses.
“The plan was to get the bonus seconds with several female athletes. In fact, we helped each other sprint.
For the next two stages, the team's strategy was to “keep the winning tactics the same.”
“I think tomorrow [Wednesday] we will do the same intermediate sprint as we did today, but probably with a few girls again, and on stages,” de Zoete concluded.
Nemanova led the sprint until de Zoete passed her in the final 25 meters; the 26-year-old Czech has had a tough 2024 season with multiple injuries.
“I am very happy with this podium because it has been a difficult season for me with a lot of stress due to physical problems. I am really happy to be on the podium today. I was so close to winning. I'm a little disappointed that we didn't win, but I think we can be proud of our performance.”
“We are here with a small team of four, so we are going to gamble a little bit with the other teams in the finale. We tried to do an intermediate sprint with Eleonora Gasparini, but not with the whole team. When the other teams focused on that, it was quite difficult.”
“I had great support from my teammates and when we trust each other it always works out. Eleonora did a great job in the last kilometer and we knew we needed to start sprinting on the bridge where she started her run so we didn't lose any speed momentum. Unfortunately, we came up a little short of the win. But I will try again tomorrow,” Nemanova added.
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