Annamiek van Vlueten must be cursed when it comes to the Olympics.
The Dutch woman had an incredible crash in the Rio games while leading the race. Since then, she has dominated road cycling along with her Dutch teammates. Van Vlueten won the 2018 and 2019 World Championships and the 2020 European Championship.
With by far the strongest team, and a tough hilly course to suit her unmatched climbing abilities, Van Vleuten was heavy favourite for gold in Tokyo.
The race began as most road races do with a break forming early on. They created a gap of over 10 minutes to the peloton before the German team, and then the Dutch, tried to reel them in.
With less than 10km to go they still had a decent lead, but the Dutch team effectively time trialled their way back into the race and the break was caught with five kilometres to go.
Van Vlueten attacked and crossed the line with her hands in the air. She thought had earned redemption for Rio and won the gold medal.
Avv: “I didn’t know. I was wrong. I didn’t know”
Van Vleuten confirms she thought she had won the Olympic title #TOKYO2020— Jøsé Been (@TourDeJose) July 25, 2021
Only she wasn't aware that they hadn't caught all of the break.
Anna Kiesenhofer of Austria had been on the attack from the opening 10km, and simply rode off the front of the leading group to solo to an incredible win.
Her only wins in the last five years have been in the Austrian Championships, and she doesn't ride in the women's World Tour. The 30-year-old was the beneficiary of some poor Dutch tactics today and finished one minute and 15 seconds ahead of Van Vleuten to claim the biggest prize in women's road cycling.
Anna vd Breggen: “only race without communications. Break takes 11 minutes. You should count how many riders are caught. We went to car but in final you count. I started counting and we calculated it was okay but we didn’t have the right info From many sides it was confusing”
— Jøsé Been (@TourDeJose) July 25, 2021
Van Vleuten's teammate, the current world champions Anna van der Breggan,blamed the lack of radio communications for the error. While that's partly true, don't rule our the idea that Van Vlueten is cursed at the Olympics. She'll be 41 in Paris, so may not get the chance to win gold and the ultimate redemption.
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