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and here's another video:
The race was marred by a huge crash, and one of the riders to watch for Sunday's Road World Cup, Chantal Blaak (Tibco), was taken to hospital with a suspected broken collarbone, but was battered but not broken - and one of the favourites for the win, Specialized-lululemon's Ina-Yoko Teutenberg was knocked unconscious. Luckily, after a hospital visit, she was released with "just" bruising and face injuries. Her team-mates were posting photos of her smiling through her injuries, and she was well enough to tweet in the evening:
To be honest I now remember again why I avoid crashing....it fucking hurts!
— Ina-Yoko Teutenberg (@yokoteute) March 7, 2013
and had lovely things to say about her team-mate, Ellen van Dijk, who turned round and rode back to make sure help could come to the injured riders as quickly as possible. It's an exciting race weekend, with the first World Cup of the season - but Van Dijk's tweet sums things up.
What a horrible day on the bike. An unconsious teammate on the ground makes you realise how unimportant bike racing can be.
— Ellen van Dijk (@ellenvdijk) March 7, 2013
The crashes aside, the race ended up just as predicted, with a bunch sprint. Virtual Directeur Sportifs, this one scores down to 15th place.
1. Marianne Vos (Ned) Rabobank-Liv/Giant, 3:26:50
2. Giorgia Bronzini (Ita) Wiggle Honda, s.t.
3. Emma Johansson (Swe) ORICA-AIS, s.t.
4. Shelley Olds (USA) TIBCO, s.t.
5. Elena Cecchini (Ita) Faren-Let's Go Finland, s.t.
6. Ellen van Dijk (Ned) Specialized-lululemon, s.t.
7. Chloe Hosking (Aus) Hitec Products UCK, s.t.
8. Lucy Garner (GBr) Argos-Shimano, s.t.
9. Megan Guarnier (USA) Rabobank-Liv/Giant, s.t.
10. Alexandra Burchenkova (Rus) RusVelo, s.t.
11. Trixi Worrack (Ger) Specialized-lululemon, s.t.
12. Kelly Markus (Ned) Argos-Shimano, s.t.
13. Pascale Jeuland (Fra) France, s.t.
14. Carmen Small (USA) Specialized-lululemon, s.t.
15. Annelies van Doorslaer (Bel) Cyclcelive Plus-Zannata, s.t.
Full results on the race website
Palm Pro Cycling translated Vos' interview after the race for us - thankyou so much, Palm!
That's Emma Johansson's fourth third place in the four European races she's ridden so far this year, demonstrating what a superb all-round talent she is, and boding very well for her GC chances once the stage races start.
It was also a great result for Lucy Garner, in 8th. The 2011 and 2012 Junior Road World Champion is racing for the seniors for the first time, and she had some lovely quotes for how it felt to finish in the top ten - here's an example, from Cycling Weekly.
ORICA-AIS DS, Dave McPartland had some interesting comments on the race, in the race report on the team site
And finally, if you want to see some photos of the race, have a look at CJ Farhquarson's on WomensCycling.net, and on Cyclingnews.
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Ronde van Drenthe World Cup, Saturday 9th March
The weather is apparently very bad in Drenthe, so we're awaiting updates to see if the race will be able to go ahead - keep an eye on the race website and twitter. Assuming everything's OK, the race starts at 14:00 CET, and will be streamed live by RTV Drenthe, on their tv player. Here's the schedule
EDIT: I't turns out, the women start at 11:30and finish before the live transmission. So hopefully they show delayed images of the women before going to the men. No info on it though.
Saturday 9th March 2013
15:00 CET (2pm GMT; 9am USA EST; 1am Sunday Aus NSW): Part of the World Cup, live! men's race men's race live. Possibly highlights of the women's race?
20:10 CET (7:10pm GMT; 2:10pm USA EST; 6:10am Sunday Aus NSW): Highlights of the World Cup
EDIT: we apologise for any confusion here - it's yet again tripped us up, imagine much hair-tearing going on
If you want to follow the race as it happens on Twitter, I recommend my usual trio of stars: Tibco DS Manel Lacambra, Hitec manager Karl Lima and Boels mechanic Richie Steege. I’ve got a twitter list for other accounts that sometimes give real-time updates, and I’ll edit that as I go. The race twitter is @RondevDrenthe, hopefully they’ll update there, and there will be all kinds of updates on the #RvD hashtag – and I’ll be on twitter as @_pigeons_, as always. And we'll have a livethread right here! If you're a lurker, or new to the Café, don't be shy, come and join us as we chat through the race. if you're new to women's cycling, we'll answer any and all questions, and do everything we can to help you love it!
If you want to know more about the race, have a look at my race preview - and I interviewed 2010 winner Loes Gunnewijk about the race and more - have a read! And I am always a big fan of Marijn de Vries' blogging, but this is lovely. The Lotto rider grew up in the area, and has a lot of family ties here. She wrote a piece on Cyclismas about her childhood memories of the roads she'll be racing on, with lovely photos of her as a child. Finally, if you want to listen to omnevelnihil and me rhapsodising about Drenthe and more, listen to our latest women's cycling podcast.
Finally, a question for Dutch speakers - while I was looking to see if the RTV Drenthe promo trailer (with jingle!) was on youtube, I found this - does it mean Drenthe wants to host the 2020 Road World Championships? Now, that would be fun! I hope they get it.
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The UCI Stakeholder Survey
You may wonder why it is that a small local tv station is streaming the race internationally, and the UCI aren't, after the comments they made early in the year about streaming women's road races on their Youtube - and you've probably got strong views about something the UCI does, so if you haven't already completed the UCI Stakeholder Survey, why not take 10(ish) minutes and fill it in? The closing date is 15th March, and of course I'd like it if you asked for more support for women's cycling - but this is an important chance for fans to have their say. We don't know what the UCI will do with the information, but still, let's do our bit.
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Check back to the comments for anything else we see, or any questions you might have - I look forward to joining you in the livethread tomorrow!