Vollering throws down gauntlet with ominous message to her rivals

Demi Vollering of the Netherlands staked her claim to take back-to back Tour de France Femmes titles with an emphatic time-trial win in front of home crowds in Rotterdam, which took her into the race leader's yellow jersey.

- Jeremy Whittle

"I really didn't see this coming," a tearful Vollering, of the SD Worx Protime team, said after taking the race lead on stage three. "I had no idea that I could do this today."

Vollering, whose win in the race last year was founded on her climbing prowess, overwhelmed her main rivals in the short, flat time trial, to win by five seconds from the Paris Olympic team pursuit gold medallist Chloé Dygert, of Canyon-SRAM Racing.

On a rare day for the Tour de France, the racing was split into two stages - a short, flat road stage in the morning, in which the stage one winner Charlotte Kool, racing for Team DSM-Firmenich PostNL, again got the better of Vollering's teammate Lorena Wiebes and Marianne Vos, of Visma Lease-a-bike- and a time trial in the afternoon.

But after a hasty turnaround, from morning road racing to afternoon time-trialling, Vollering asserted her superiority and established herself as the rider to beat.