We crossed the line in fourth place today in the opening stage of the Giro d’Italia Donne in Cuneo, Italy. The team was just six seconds from a podium spot and put in an impressive performance after it was forced to ride with five riders after just one kilometre of racing.

“It was a shame we lost Tiff so early, especially because she was really motivated for it. That was disappointing but otherwise we actually rode quite smoothly. After the course recon on Wednesday I would say that Mikayla and Elise fitted in really well to our team set up for the TTT,” said Hannah Barnes after the finish.

“It was even more important that we had Alexis with us for as long as possible. Alexis has had some bad experiences with past TTT’s and hasn’t always been strong enough to help, so I was really pleased to see her able to contribute as much as she did. Alexis was there until just a few kilometres to go so it was a big help. As a team, today’s performance still gives us confidence for the next stages,” added Hannah.

Teammate Mikayla Harvey led the team across the line, finishing with an average speed of 46.525km/hour.

“Team time trialling is so tough!” exclaimed Mikayla.

“We had some bad luck when we lost Tiff but we managed to get everything back together quite quickly once we decided to not wait any longer. I’m happy with my performance and I could do some hard turns at the front. We all can take something from our preparation and the race itself. I personally learned a lot from the team and my teammates! It’s disappointing to come fourth and be just six seconds off the podium. But I’m motivated and ready for the rest of the tour.”

The 26.7km team time trial stage was won by Trek Segafredo with Ruth Winder taking the first Maglia Rosa of the ten-day stage race. Our best placed rider on the general classification is Mikayla in fourteenth place and 46 seconds behind the leader.

Stage two moves straight to a summit finish with the peloton racing to the top of the thirteen-kilometre long Prato Nevoso climb. Tomorrow’s stage starts at 12:10CEST and broadcast starts at 14:30EST.

The live broadcasts can be found on: GCN+, Eurosport Player, PMGSport YouTube, PMGsport Facebook, TuttoBici, Claro, SBS, NOS, Spark Sport, RaiSport, EBU, SABC Sport and BBC.

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