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France’s Pauline Ferrand-Prévôt overcame sickness and a crash to win the Paris-Roubaix women’s race for the first time on Saturday.
The 33-year-old delivered a well-timed solo breakaway, added the prestigious and gruelling Spring classic to her Olympic mountain bike gold medal at the Paris Games last year and the 2014 world road race title.
“It could be my best win ever,” Ferrand-Prévôt said.“I’m super happy but I don’t realise it yet. I was sick the last couple of days, so I was not sure this morning if I was going to participate. It’s good that finally I took the start.
“Winning here is just amazing,” she added after crossing the finish line at the Roubaix velodrome. “My boyfriend [Dylan van Baarle] won [the men’s trophy] three years ago, so now I won. We will have two [trophies] at home.”
The 148.5km (92-mile) race featured 29.2 km (18 miles) of cobbles and Ferrand-Prévôt was one of several riders to fall entering one of those stretches, with 54km to go. But she was unharmed and quickly rejoined the peloton.
Although she was supposed to be tactically riding for her Visma-Lease a Bike teammate, Marianne Vos, Ferrand-Prévôt sensed an opportunity and launched her attack with about 18km left on the road to Roubaix, close to the Belgian border. “I had a gap and I tried to go until the end,” she said afterwards.
None of Ferrand-Prévôt’s rivals could catch her and she entered the velodrome on her own with the crowd cheering. She finished 58 seconds clear of Italian Letizia Borghesi (EF Education-Oatly) and 1min 1sec ahead of Dutch rider Lorena Wiebes (Team SD-Work-Protime) in third.
Vos was fourth and Alison Jackson (EF Education-Oatly) of Canada fifth, as Ferrand-Prévôt became the first rider from France to win the women’s race, which was first held in 2021.
“The first, but maybe the last one,” she said, smiling. “I just tried to survive in the cobblestone section.” Defending champion Lotte Kopecky of Belgium (Team SD-Work-Protime) – who is also the road race world champion – was 2:04 behind in 12th spot. Britain’s Pfeiffer Georgi was one place behind, with Zoe Backstedt in 15th.
The men’s race is on Sunday and sees three-time Tour de France champion Tadej Pogačar competing in the “Hell of the North” race for the first time. The 26-year-old will be the first reigning Tour de France champion to tackle the race in 34 years.
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“We’re here and we go for it. Every race is hard to win and every race is exciting,” said the Slovenian. “I’m nervous today but we’ll see tomorrow. It’s no more dangerous than a mass sprint at the Tour de France,” he said.
