Johansson celebrates her first Binda Trophy

If an Italian doesn’t make the grade, I hope the winner is Emma Johansson, a champion who, all too often, has come close to success but never made it.” Mario Minervino, the organizer of the Binda Trophy in women’s cycling, was right on the eve of the race: his prediction came true in the afternoon of Saturday, 30 March, in Cittiglio, where the strong Swedish athlete won, for the first time, the race that is the only Italian event in the Women’s World Cup. Johansson, 30, a member of the women’s team of the Australian team Orica GreenEDGE (whose European base is in Varese Province), took the lead at the end of an exciting race on a sunny spring day, by way of “compensation” for 2013, when bad weather had been in command.

On the finishing line in Via Valcuvia, Johansson beat some of the other favourites in a short sprint; on the podium, there were the Briton Elisabeth Armitstead (Boels) and the Belarusian Alena Amialiusik (Astana-Be Pink). Then, after Van der Breggen and Ferrand-Prévot, came the outgoing champion Elisa Longo Borghini, the best of the Italians, in sixth place, also because in such a tough sprint, she could hardly hope to succeed, not being a specialist. The 2014 Binda Trophy was decided when, with the finishing line in sight, the group of eight broke away on the last passage through Orino, at the top of the slope that the athletes had to go over several times. It was Johansson who took the lead in the decisive Queen of the Mountains, splitting the group that had already been reduced to a few dozen.

It is a pity that Giorgia Bronzini failed to make it into the small group of runaways: the Italian twice World Champion, was all set for the final sprint, but then had to be satisfied with regulating her sprint, for ninth place, 49’’ after the winner.

With this victory in Cittiglio, Johansson has taken a step up in the World Cup classification, although Armitstead’s second place allows the Briton to remain at the top, as they wait, alas, for the return to the street races of the “cannibal” Marianne Vos, who was not on the roads of Valcuvia today. But, as they say, the absentees are always wrong, and Johansson deservedly came first.

 

ARCOBALENO JUNIORES – The Binda Trophy was preceded, in the morning, by the international race dedicated to the women’s junior division, a prestigious event, as these young women rarely have the opportunity to compete abroad. The finishing order confirmed the importance of the Da Moreno Trophy; victory went to the Dane, Amalie Dideriksen, the reigning World Champion in the junior division. As in the case of the Binda, the winners were all foreign: after Dideriksen, there were the French women Richioud and Lamboley, after 12’’ and 22’’, respectively. Fourth, and first among the Italians, was Maria Vittoria Sperotto, for GS Gauss.