Today’s race consisted of a big loop followed by four twenty-kilometre local laps. No rider managed to escape in the big loop. It wasn’t until the peloton arrived at the first local lap that the race caught fire.

The local lap had one challenging climb. On this climb, Henderson was able to defend for a long time, but on the climb’s last passage, the British rider had to give in. She ended up in the chasing group together with teammate Karlijn Swinkels. They tried to come back but only managed to limit the damage. Both Team Jumbo-Visma riders are still in the top ten of the general classification.

Race coach Carmen Small saw that her team was struggling today. “The team rode a good race. Unfortunately, we missed the last break. It was difficult because there were only four of us. We cannot respond to every attack. It wasn’t that the ladies didn’t try or didn’t want to; it just didn’t work out. It was a tough race. Tomorrow we will go for it again.”

Festival Elsy Jacobs’ final stage is scheduled for Sunday. Small remained ambitious. “Hopefully we can go for the stage win. There are also bonus seconds at the finish. If we want to go for the general classification, we will probably also have to win the stage. Anna and Karlijn showed today that they are the strongest riders on the team. Noemi and Jip will ride for these two tomorrow and try to race more aggressively. That suits our riders better than defending, I think.”