2020 Strade Bianche Results

Victory goes to Dutch rider Annemiek Van Vleuten (Mitchelton-Scott) and Belgian Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo – Visma) in the 2020 edition of everyone’s favorite new classic.

Van Vleuten Repeats

Van Vleuten defended her 2019 victory in the women’s edition with a time of 4h3’54”, besting Margarita Garcia Cañellas of the Alé BTC Ljubljana team by 22” and Leah Thomas of Équipe Paule Ka by 1’53”. This is the fifth win in five starts for the World Champion.

The 37-year-old looked to be out of the running before bridging across to a group of chasers with 16kilometres remaining and then hunting down a lone leader to take another memorable victory on the white roads of Tuscany.

Van Vleuten’s teammate Amanda Spratt, part of an 11 rider breakaway, managed to stay near the front of the race when Van Vleuten bridged from the peloton to join her.

The world champion quickly went to the front and drove the pace following a strong turn from Spratt. The rest of the chasers couldn’t live with the injection of pace and Van Vleuten went in pursuit of Garcia alone. The gap quickly began to fall, and the catch was eventually made on the outskirts of Siena.

Garcia held on doggedly with Van Vleuten unable to shake the Spaniard off her wheel despite a number of attacks, and it looked like it would come down to the final climb to the finish. As the duo rolled under the flamme rouge Van Vleuten moved to the front and launched her final assault, dropping Garcia to solo to another famous victory.

“Everything hard is good for me and is bad for my opponents, so I just think ‘I love the heat’,” said Van Vleuten at the finish.

“I’ve got so many emotions today, at first, I thought I came here for nothing. I couldn’t make my attack as my teammate Amanda was in front, and then suddenly a girl is away, Mavi Garcia, a really strong rider then I had to go full on the attack, so there were a lot of emotions.

“The speed was out of the group and then suddenly my team director said ‘Annemiek time for action’ just before the second to last gravel section, that was really uphill. That was actually the moment I had in my head to attack from the group in front hopefully, but now I had to attack there to close the gap.

Speaking seconds after the finish, a victorious Annemiek Van Vleuten said: “Piazza del Campo is the most beautiful place for me to win a race. I had a lot of emotions today. I didn’t think I would catch Mavi Garcia and I believe the whole scenario has made it a very spectacular race.”

1. Annemiek Van Vleuten (Mitchelton-Scott) 136km in 4h03’54”
2. Margarita Garcia Cañellas (Alé BTC Ljubljana) at 22”
3. Leah Thomas (Équipe Paule Ka) at 1’53”

Solo Victory for Van Aert

Belgian Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo – Visma) won the 14th edition of Strade Bianche EOLO; part of the UCI WorldTour, the race covered 184km from Siena to Siena (Piazza del Campo). Taking the win in the historic square, he beat Davide Formolo (UAE Team Emirates) and Maximilian Schachmann (BORA – Hansgrohe).

The Jumbo-Visma rider, who had finished third in the previous two editions of the 184km race through Tuscany, finished ahead of Italy’s Davide Formolo of UAE Emirates on the Piazza del Campo in Siena. Germany’s Maximilian Schachmann, riding for Bora-Hansgrohe, finished third.

“Over the last two editions of Strade Bianche, I gained a lot of confidence,” said Van Aert. “It’s never easy to win and it was harder than usual in today’s circumstances. It makes the win even better. This is proof that I’m at the highest level now. To have won Strade Bianche at the age of only 25, with a cyclocross background is a huge achievement.”

Vincenzo Nibali crashed with Peter Sagan also among the many riders who failed to finish the gruelling race.

1. Wout van Aert (Team Jumbo – Visma) 184km in 4h58’56”
2. Davide Formolo (UAE Team Emirates) at 30″
3. Maximilian Schachmann (BORA – Hansgrohe) at 32″