Jolien D'hoore beats Lotte Kopecky to Gent-Wevelgem victory

Updated 11/10/2020 at 19:40 GMT

It was a Belgian one-two at Gent-Wevelgem as Jolien D'hoore beat Lotte Kopecky in a thrilling sprint in the Flanders classic. All of the cycling classics are available to watch live on Eurosport and the GCN Race Pass, with the Tour of Flanders coming up on Sunday 18 October.

olien D'hoore of Belgium and Boels Dolmans Cycling Team / Lotte Kopecky of Belgium and Team Lotto Soudal Ladies / Lisa Brennauer of Germany and Ceratizit - WNT Pro Cycling Team / during the 9th Gent-Wevelgem In Flanders Fields 2020, Women Elite a 141,4km

Image credit: Getty Images

Boels-Dolmans' Jolien D’Hoore out-sprinted fellow Belgian Lotte Kopecky on home roads to claim victory at Sunday’s Flanders classic Gent-Wevelgem.

Amy Pieters of Boels-Dolmans led out Gent local D’Hoore in the final few hundred metres of the 141km race and only Kopecky and Lisa Brennauer of Ceratizit-WNT could follow, with the German rounding off the podium in third.

In damp and windy autumnal conditions the route served up a terrific race, with numerous attacks going off the front, including what turned out to be the winning move.

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The chasing pack had the leaders firmly in their sights on the finishing straight, but the front group were too strong and held on to battle it out in the sprint amongst themselves.

Gent-Wevelgem - As it happened

D’Hoore said: “I’m really super happy, the team did a perfect job today. I’m so happy I could win in the special season - it’s a bit weird but it’s always nice and takes the pressure off if you can win.”

Trek-Segafredo, who controlled much of the race and made the first attacks in the sprint for the line, were left disappointed as Britain’s Lizzie Deignan, in the purple WorldTour leader’s jersey, left her sprint too late to catch the Belgian duo, finishing outside the top five.

However, Boels-Dolmans played a perfectly tactical race on familiar roads, forcing their nearest rivals Trek-Segafredo to work hard in the crosswinds with Elisa Longo Borghini - who crashed early on - controlling the front group, while Amy Pieters and D'Hoore were tucked inside for the race's climbs.

Trek-Segafredo's Ellen Van Dijk launched a sprint with 3.4km to go followed by fellow lead-out woman Longo Borghini to split the front group forcing Amy Pieters to go on the attack.

With 1km to go, as the roads flattened out into Wevelgem, Canyon-Sram led the chase group to reduce the gap to the front group to eight seconds.

Pieters got away by a few metres with Longo Borghini pushing hard to catch her, but it was enough to launch her teammate into a sprint for the line.

Race favourite and last year’s winner Kirsten Wild withdrew from the race on Saturday after contracting Covid-19.

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