Hello lovely subscribers! A very merry Christmas to you all 🎄.
This is our final issue of 2022 and we have a festive treat for you – it’s a mixed bag (or Santa’s sack, if you will) but we hope you enjoy!
Before we get stuck in, a huge thank you to every single one of you for subscribing to and supporting our newsletter this year! WCW has really had a glow up in 2022 and we (literally) couldn’t have done it without our subscribers. We can’t wait to bring you EVEN MORE women’s cycling content in 2023 – it’s gonna be our year, I can feel it🔮.
Amy x
P.s we recorded our Christmas pod this week and it’s v chaotic but hopefully fun!
Tilda’s emoji quiz 🤓
You know we LOVE emojis here at WCW, so how about a game - can you name these iconic 2022 moments that we’ve described in emojis? 🤔 Have a good look, think outside the box and comment your guesses below!
🚴♀️🇳🇱🐶🖐🚫⏯️🚴♀️🇫🇷🏆
🇫🇷🪨🪨🪨🇪🇸🚴♀️🚗💥🤕
🥇🇳🇱😁💪🇮🇹
🇬🇧🧐🇮🇹⏱️1️⃣⏯️💨💨💨🏆😁🥈🇦🇺😔
🇫🇷💨🏆💛🥳🤱👶🇳🇱
[If you get all of these right then you can take over this newsletter tbh — Amy]
Answers will be in the next edition!
Our fav moments of 2022 💘
Tilds
The problem with having a year as action-packed, trail-blazing and record-breaking as 2022 has been in women’s cycling, is that it’s rather hard to choose your favourite moments. Of course, the Tour de France Femmes has to be up there: its long-awaited return, the spectacle of the whole thing, and not to mention a great week of racing, plus it was a magical experience to get to work on the first edition. But, also, EVERYONE says the Tour, and it’s a disservice to what has been an amazing year of racing to let it cast its big yellow shadow on everything else.
For me, my favourite one-day race of the year has to be Strade Bianche. As the first WWT race of the season, the anticipation was really building, and what a race we were given. After the chaos of the gravel roads, it all came down to the final climb in Siena, and anyone would have had their money on Annemiek van Vleuten, but Lotte Kopecky pulled out some dynamite climbing (and a mad little move on the final corner) to beat AVV in spectacular fashion. It was iconic, and I am never not thinking about it tbh.
If picking a favourite Classic was hard, though, I found it EVEN HARDER to pick a favourite stage race. They’ve been incredible this season, right??? But perhaps the best was the Tour de Suisse, wow that race had everything. Circuit racing, climbing, a TT and then one of the maddest final days we’ve seen all year. From Jolanda Neff and Lucinda Brand’s masterclass in descending, to Kristen Faulkner clawing her way back on the climb, just to then lose the race with a crash on the final corner… It may not have been a WWT race, and it was only four days, but Suisse delivered drama in BUCKETS and if you missed any of it, give yourself a Christmas treat and watch that final stage 🔥
Amy
As Tilda said, it’s been one HELL of a year for women’s cycling, and the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift has played a massive part in that. As much as that race, and the experience of covering it, was incredible, there were so many more moments outside of it that are worth shouting about!
There are a few that stand out for me, and Tilda has already nicked some of them (Strade, *that* Suisse stage) so I’ll dive straight in with Marta Cavalli’s genius move at Amstel Gold that won her her first WWT race.
Away from the road it’s no secret that I have fallen in love with track and become especially ✨obsessed✨ with women’s sprinting and in particular the if-looks-could-kill intimidation tactic employed by world champion Mathilde Gros. It’s dramatic, it’s intense, it’s fast, it’s good for people with no attention span (me) it’s *chef’s kiss*.
Honourable mention also goes to Elisa Longo Borghini’s win at Paris Roubaix because I’m a proper Classics girlie now.
The ghost of WCW yet to come
Ok I realise this heading sounds a bit ominous (also def the scariest ghost in A Christmas Carol so soz) but I wanted to stick with the Xmas theme to tell you all about what’s coming up at WCW.
We’ve got some v exciting developments including a cheeky rebrand, actual IRL trips to races (eeeeee), and a few different ways to make this newsy more interactive because we love hearing from you guys and chatting to you!!
We’ll also be making a *proper* plan for the TDFF and taking this newsy on the road to bring you some (hopefully) super fun, ✨unique✨ newsletter and podcast content!
Watch this space!
Stocking Fillers 🎁
Some little bits and bobs to look at, listen to, and read!
“How some Canadian ‘cross racers celebrate Christmas when in Europe.”
Bringing back the heartwarming, tenuously cycling-related, local news stories for Xmas with this one about a group of cyclists in Canada who clubbed together to get a little girl a new bike!
The normal bits
Results 🏆
UCI Cyclocross World Cup Val di Sole (Rnd 10) 🇮🇹
Puck Pieterse
Ceylin Del Carmen Alvarado
Manon Bakker
Upcoming races 📆
Cyclocross doesn’t care about Christmas, so while you’re tucking into your turkey sandwiches you can watch the cross racers braving the Belgian elements at:
26th December: UCI Cyclocross World Cup Gavere (Rnd 11)
Starts 13.40 CET
Live on Eurosport/GCN+
27th December: Superprestige Heusden-Zolder (Rnd 5)
Starts 14.30 CET
Live on Eurosport/GCN+
28th December: Superprestige Diegem (Rnd 6)
Starts 19.00 CET
Live on Eurosport/GCN+
💔
Sorry to end this one on a slightly sad note but this week the final Freewheeling with all the gang came out featuring my Xmas quiz! We’ve both LOVED being a part of the podcast and are super sad to see it end in its current iteration. Hopefully we can get the band back together down the line!
That’s all 🎄🎅
Thanks for reading Women’s Cycling Weekly, I hope you have had a lovely Christmas and a happy new year — see you on the other side!
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Until 2023,
Amy & Tilda x
Merry Christmas from Women's Cycling Weekly 🎄