Rowe battles to third after stranger’s mercy dash
It was the “hardest, most painful day” of her career. But in the end Dani Rowe just about managed to cling on, grimly at times, finishing in the main bunch in Colwyn Bay at the end of stage five to wrap up a hugely impressive third place in the Ovo Energy Women’s Tour.
Rowe was ultimately unable to catch the American Coryn Rivera (Sunweb), who secured a worthy overall victory by 11 seconds from Rowe’s Waowdeals team-mate Marianne Vos on the final stage won by Lotta Lepisto (Cervelobigla). But the fact that Rowe finished the race at all was pretty remarkable, and owed much to the kindness of strangers.
Less than 24 hours earlier, the London 2012 Olympic gold medallist had suffered a 60kph crash, which left her nursing a nasty case of road rash and a badly swollen knee. Rowe’s Twitter SOS on Saturday night, appealing for “someone in the Telford area” to come to her rescue with “an ice compression machine”, was answered by one Gary Darling-parkes, a medic with GWAS Ambulance.
Mr Darling-parkes was not even in the Telford area. He was at a polo event in Cardiff. But he made a special four-hour round trip to Rowe’s hotel to deliver the equipment and apply tape to her leg.
“I’d never met the guy before in my life,” Rowe said yesterday after collapsing just beyond the finish line and breaking down in tears. “He was absolutely amazing.”
Rowe still had to produce one of the gutsiest performances of her life. With the top 28 riders in the field all separated by less than a minute, a couple of big Snowdonia climbs ahead of them and some foul weather closing in, stage five was always going to be a battle.
Rowe was dropped from the front group on the first categorised climb of the day, Bwlch-y-maen, but managed to get back on terms. Then, having made it over the day’s major climb, Nant Gwynant, in touch with the leaders, she missed a key move, Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon SRAM), Elisa Longo Borghini (Wiggle-high5), Amy Pieters (Boelsdolmans) and the Sunweb duo of Lucinda Brand and Rivera escaping with 20kilometres remaining and opening up a gap of 16 seconds.
“I was just hoping it would come back because there was nothing I could do at that stage,” Rowe admitted. Fortunately for her, it did.
“Even then, with 4km to go, it was absolute gutter action because of the wind,” Rowe added. “I’ve never suffered so much in a race, in terms of being in pain. I think it’s my best ever result on the road.”
Organisers Sweetspot will reflect happily on this fifth edition of the race, which sets the benchmark for women’s cycling. But they will reflect, too, that the race could have been harder, and longer.
The need for a couple of extra stages, plus live television coverage, are the next priorities.