Team SD Worx are heading into Flanders with seven one-day race wins already banked, four at WorldTour level. Their worst result at a one-day classic so far is a third place from Lorena Wiebes at Brugge — De Panne after the team DSM duo of Pfeiffer Georgi and Megan Jastrab played them at their own game — Georgi riding solo to victory.
Their tactic is a straight-forward numbers game: build a collection of some of the peloton’s strongest riders to ensure that you have options late into the race to attack and cover moves — and, if she makes it, there’s always Lorena Wiebes for a sprint. This depth from SD Worx is nothing new — they have long been one of, if not the, best squads in the Women’s WorldTour — but a series of astute signings have allowed them to weather losing key classics players like Amy Pieters and Chantal van den Broek Blaak, as well as leader Anna van der Breggen.
Also read: Everything you need to know about the 2023 Tour of Flanders
Alongside the imperious duo of Lotte Kopecky and Demi Vollering, Swiss rider Marlen Reusser, who joined the team in 2022, has given SD Worx a foil to Trek-Segafredo’s powerhouse time triallist-cum-break-killer Ellen van Dijk. This year, with van Dijk away on maternity leave, Reusser stands above the rest in her methodical dismantling of time gaps and, in the case of Gent-Wevelgem, using her time trial prowess to take solo victories.
Lacking a pure sprinter in 2022, SD Worx duly snapped up the best in the peloton in the form of Wiebes, who, like clockwork, set about winning sprinter’s classics like Ronde van Drenthe (although she may have challenge on her hands in the form of Charlotte Kool later in the season).
A by-product of Wiebes joining the team is that the European Champion’s presence in a chasing group appears to deter any sense of cooperation from her colleagues, leaving SD Worx with a literal win-win situation if the escapee up the road is a teammate.
This sense of defeat from other teams in recent races begs the question: Is simply the case that SD Worx’s backup options are as strong as other teams’ leaders, or are they winning races before the flag has even dropped?
After the team played their numbers to perfection at Dwars door Vlaanderen on Wednesday, allowing Demi Vollering to solo to victory, Marianne Vos — who spent a chunk of the race in a two-up break with Reusser — said: “They are incredibly strong, and there are different teams with different strengths, but SD Worx has the depth and a very strong team.”
While it’s true that SD Worx have the depth, there are at least two other teams who can match them at Flanders if they play their cards right.
Even without Van Dijk or the added reinforcement that an injured Brodie Chapman would have brought, Trek-Segafredo are perhaps best-placed as a team to go up against the Dutch squad. With the pairing of Elisa Longo Borghini and Elisa Balsamo, and cross-generational cyclocross talents Lucinda Brand and Shirin van Anrooij the team should have both the collective strength to reel back rogue moves, and the depth to enjoy multiple options well into the race.
Annemiek van Vleuten’s Movistar team has also been bolstered during the off season by the package deal of Floortje Mackaij and Liane Lippert. The world champion has historically lacked team support in the latter stages of races but with Mackaij and Lippert joining the likes of Arlenis Sierra — who rode to an impressive fourth at Flanders last year — Movistar’s numbers are suddenly up.
Van Vleuten was once the rider in danger of neutralizing races such as Flanders with her long-range solo moves that freeze her adversaries into resignation, but any chance of that happening on Sunday seems slim in the face of SD Worx and their myriad options. We will undoubtedly see Van Vleuten deploy this tactic to success on the long climbs later this season but this weekend it would likely be a fool’s errand. If she hopes to claim an historic third title then she will need to be patient.
Also read: Gallery: Gent-Wevelgem 2023
Elsewhere, one can never discount Marianne Vos who, on her return from iliac artery surgery has shown fantastic form, particularly at Dwars door Vlaanderen, but even the GOAT cannot take on SD Worx alone. Vos does have a decent team around her, including Karlijn Swinkels and Anna Henderson, but it will take more to dent SD Worx’s armor.
While FDJ-SUEZ — who are down a leader with Marta Cavalli out of action — Canyon-SRAM, and Team DSM don’t quite have the numbers of SD Worx, Trek-Segafredo, or Movistar, they do have at least two or three riders who should make it deep enough into the race to contest.
Whether the rest of the teams have numbers will not matter, however, if — as happened at Gent-Wevelgem and Dwars door Vlaanderen — they refuse to cooperate with each other to chase should an SD Worx rider make a move up the road.
The key to cracking SD Worx is cooperation against their chokehold on the race. Individualistic attacks won’t cut it if Lotte Kopecky puts in an effort like we saw on the Muur de Huy a few months ago and gets a gap, or Vollering counters while Reusser disrupts behind. If the other teams want a chance at the win they need to take SD Worx on together.
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