As the saying goes, “fortune favors the bold”. But it also favors champions we might add, and Lorena Wiebes is undeniably a great champion. When, with just 2 kilometers to go in Trento, a slippery roundabout took out 90% of the peloton from the final sprint of Stage 3 at the Giro d’Italia Women 2025, she was right there in the lucky 10% who made it through to contest the win. Call it luck, intuition, or perfect positioning, this time Wiebes even beat Lady Luck.
While the Dutch rider celebrated her fourth career win at the Giro d’Italia Women, the other sprinters could only lament their lost opportunity after the late crash dashed their hopes. Now, they’ll have to go all-in on the next sprint stage in Monselice. Finishing behind Wiebes were Josie Nelson (Picnic PostNL) and World Champion Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx-Protime), who, along with Barbara Guarischi, had perfectly set up the powerful Wiebes.
It’s hard to imagine a sprinter’s stage featuring a climb like the Passo del Tonale – designated this year’s Cima Alfonsina Strada and won by Usoa Ostolaza (Laboral Kutxa-Fundación Euskadi) – but with the ascent at the start and a long descent into Trento, it worked. Teams timed their chase well to neutralize the brave solo attack by Nora Jenčušová (BePink–Imatra–Bongioanni), who was caught with about 12 kilometers to go. From there, speeds increased dramatically until the crash at -2 km left fewer than 15 riders in contention. Christina Schweinberger (Fenix-Deceuninck) made a clever late bid, but SD Worx shut it down and cleared the runway for Wiebes’ winning launch.
Tomorrow, the sprinters will take a back seat, as the brutal climb to Pianezze promises a showdown for the general classification. Maglia Rosa Anna Henderson will need another big performance to fend off Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ) and Marlen Reusser (Movistar), both of whom have looked extremely sharp.
