Lorena Wiebes dominates first ever Copenhagen Sprint

Lorena Wiebes cruised over the line with sheer power to take the first ever Copenhagen Sprint by a significant margin over her opposition. 

The pace inside the three laps of the local circuit was a relatively relaxed and calm one as no rider dared to try their luck with an audacious attack for glory as the sprinters teams took a full and commanding control of the finale. With 8.6km to go, a huge crash occurred in a left hand turn of the circuit, which took down Georgia Baker (Liv AlUla Jayco) among others, and also caused splits in the peloton. 

The thinned-out peloton that remained was then led by SD Worx - Protime, who set it up for the European champion Lorena Wiebes along with Visma | Lease a bike and AG Insurance - Soudal Team. 

Wiebes dually delivered on her pre-race favourite status and won by bike lengths as nobody could match her sheer power. 

“It feels really great, it was a nice race," Wiebes said. "But I need to say sometimes it was a bit dangerous and I am actually a bit annoyed that the UCI are putting things different with the handlebars and stuff, but not really thinking about our safety."

The inaugural edition of the Copenhagen sprint began to the west of the city, in the town of Roskilde at 13:35 local time, where the peloton took off on their 151km effort towards the centre of Copenhagen. It remained a slow burner for the early portion of the race with the peloton packed together. They headed through the Danish countryside through towns such as Frederikssund and Hillerød on the way to the three-lap local circuit in the capital. There were some crashes on that journey as Valentine Fortin (Cofidis Women) had a minor crash and was able to continue on her way.

With just under 70km remaining, a breakaway of four riders broke free of the pack containing Julia Borgström (AG Insurance - Soudal Team), Meis Poland (VolkerWessels), Britt de Grave (DD Group) and April Tacey (Team Coop – Repsol). The group of four was kept under a tight leash with a maximum gap given to them of 00:50 seconds. Shortly after the breakaway of the day became established the Hungarian rider, Blanka Vas (SD Worx – Protime) abandoned the race.

From there, the race briefly turned into chaos, with a crash of around 20 riders in the peloton. This then led to splits in the peloton that were closed soon after. As the race approached the local circuit for the first time, April Tracey was the sole rider left from the break of the day.

With 37km remaining, April Tracey was caught by the roaring peloton whose pace gradually ramped up throughout the day. The pace remained rampant as the main contenders for the victory were positioned by their teams ready for the fast finale with no riders wanting to gamble on a late attack.

A huge crash occurred inside the last 8 km which took down which took down Georgia Baker (Liv AlUla Jayco) and others, as well as causing significant splits in the peloton.

Inside the last kilometre, SD Worx – Protime again took things up, providing a launchpad for Lorena Wiebes to secure victory. Nobody else came close.