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Olympics – Women’s Road Race

August 11th, 2008 by Ron Callahan 98 views No Comment

The women got a break from the hot and humid weather the men raced in, but typically in the summer around here, a “break” typically means rain.

As with the men, the early part of the race was uneventful. There were no breaks and the peloton was controlled by Kate Bates of Australia, Vera Carrara of Italy, time trial and cyclo-cross champion Hanka Kupfernagel of Germany and Christine Thorburn of the USA. Jeannie Longo, riding in her SEVENTH Olympics also prowled the front on several occasion

The first notable attack was by Alexandra Burchenkova of Russia with a little more than 50km to go. Kate Bates quickly pulled her back, but teammate Natalia Boyarskaya took the opening and counterattacked.

Boyarskaya quickly built up a lead, but not for long, as Amber Neben of the USA and Trixi Worrack of Germany led the chase from the field and the gap began to come down.

Emma Pooley of Great Britain and Tatiana Guderzo of Italy attacked soon after and worked together to catch Boyarskara as the bell sounded noting the final lap.

Judith Arndt of Germany led the field to pull the trio back, but there were soon escapes from Zulfia Zabirova of Kazakhstan and Longo. Christiane Soeder of Austria also tried to escape, but she was caught. Guderzo went again and quickly pulled out a 10 second lead. Soeder was not ready to quit yet and attacked, pulling Emma Johansson of Sweden, Linda Villumsen of Denmark and Nicole Cooke of Great Britain with her. The four chased down Guderzo to become five at the front.

The group of 5 rounded the corner and was looking at the final 500m of the race. Cooke slowed briefly with what seemed to be a brief technical issue, but it could have been a ruse as she then accelerated quickly, passing the other four and making it first across the line. Johansson and Guderzo still had a little left in them and fought hard for silver and bronze, respectively. Soeder and Villumsen took fourth and fifth respectively.