Gallery
Alone in the Clouds TdFF23-44
It was stunning to watch Demi Vollering (SD Worx-Protime) go on the attack in the final kilometers of the Tourmalet. She had dropped those she was with and went searching through the mist for the lone leader, Katarzyna Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM). While riding through one of the snow tunnels on the way up to the peak she caught an passed the Polish woman. Niewiadoma tried to catch the wheel of the flying Belgium, but just no longer had the legs to hold onto her wheel. I loved the sight of her climbing through the barely visible crowds looming in the low hanging cloud near the summit of the Col. With roughly five kilometers left to climb she had already put twenty-two seconds into the former leader on the road, another fifteen seconds into the former winner, Annemiek Van Vleutin, and still another forty seconds into the Maillot Jaune on the shoulders of her teammate, Lotte Kopecky.