CANYON//SRAM Racing: Lisa Brennauer crashes on Stage 1 at the Aviva Women's Tour

Lisa Brennauer has crashed in the final kilometres on stage one at the Aviva Women's Tour in Norwich today. The hectic final was won by Christine Majerus (DLT), from Marianne Vos (RBW) and Giorgia Bronzini (WHT). Tiffany Cromwell was the best placed for CANYON//SRAM Racing in 17th place.

From the seaside town of Southwold the 132km opening stage to Norwich kept a fast pace from start to finish. Hannah Barnes was in an early break with many major teams represented but it would not stay away for long. A split after the second intermediate sprint with 50km to race, with Lisa Brennauer present also came back to the peloton and it was a solo move by Alison Tetrick (CPC) in the last 25km that was the longest break of the day. Tetrick was caught in the final metres for a win by Majerus.

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Cromwell described the race as fast with a chaotic final. "The whole stage was fast. At times it was aggressive but the roads are so fast there wasn't much chance that anything would stick. The final was ridiculously hectic and it was sketchy. We tried in the final kilometres, but it wasn't smooth, and after Lisa crashed, Elena and I were held up and we couldn't get a result."

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Brennauer was caught in a crash around 1.5km to race. "In the last 5km you could see all the teams forming their lead out. We found each other, but then we got split, and then came back together again and then I crashed. In the crash I don't know what caused it because it happened behind me. All I know is that something hit the back of my bike really hard. My bike turned sideways immediately and I didn't have control of it anymore, especially because I didn't see it coming, and I went down. I will have to see how I feel tomorrow."

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Stage two tomorrow from Atherstone to Stratford-Upon-Avon starts at 10:00 BST. The 140km stage, the longest for the tour, is the first of the stages with a hillier profile and is likely to start to form the general classification contenders.

Follow the racing action live on the team's Twitter @WMNcycling using #AvivaWT2016 and #UCIWWT. One hour highlight programs will be broadcast each evening on ITV4 as well as worldwide broadcasts in Australia (Fox), France (L'Equipe), and the USA (NBC Sports).

by Beth Duryea

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