Talking TDU 🦘
Whad'ya reckon?
Hello lovely subscribers! ✨
It started on a Sunday, it happened in the middle of the night (for us), and it was only three stages, but with the Tour Down Under taking place this week the 2023 season has officially started!
Obviously, we have ✨ thoughts ✨ and so we thought we’d go through some of the biggest talking points to come out of the race.
As well as writing about it, though, we’re also going to be bringing you a TDU podcast this Friday and joining us to chew over the events of the week is a very special guest: Abby Mickey! So if you’ve been missing your Freewheeling fix you can tune in and hear Abby talk tactics, and Tilda give her stage-by-stage roundup while I (Amy) chime in with… vibes?
Stay tuned! But for now: here’s our TDU talking points.
Grace Brown is on 🔥
I mean, duh, she won the thing overall AND took the points jersey to boot. Brown knew exactly what she was doing from stage one, out-sprinting Jayco’s speedy duo of Ruby Roseman-Gannon and Alex Manly to get the maximum 3 bonus seconds in the intermediate in the bank. She then went and hoovered up some more on stage two which gave her a handy buffer on the final day where riders faced the tough Corkscrew Road climb.
In the end, though, it was a buffer she barely even needed as she went on to storm her way to the win in a head-to-head with Amanda Spratt and secure both the stage and the overall. A barnstorming performance from Brown as she goes into her second season with FDJ-SUEZ.
Spratty is back
She may have narrowly missed out on the win, but the Tour Down Under definitely confirmed that Aussie veteran Amanda Spratt is back, and in a big way. After spending much of 2022 building back to form due to having iliac artery surgery in the off-season, it was new team, same old Spratty in Adelaide at the weekend. When riders are in the later part of the career, it can be easy to wonder if they can really get back to their best if they have to take time out with injury or illness, but Spratt has come out the gates strong and saying yep, it’s 2023 and I’m definitely back.
As well as bossing the Corkscrew Road stage - the kind of terrain where we expect the 35-year-old to do well - Spratt has also seemed to start the year with some insane sprinting form? After three top-10s (including a very close second behind Ruby Roseman-Gannon) at the Bay Crits, she kicked off the TDU with fifth on the opening stage, rubbing shoulders with the sprinters and beating Schwalbe Classic winner Ally Wollaston. On stage 2, won by Alex Manly, she also collected 10th, and though she couldn’t quite beat Brown to the line on the final day, a rider who can climb like Spratty and has a decent sprint on them is going to be a pretty dangerous contender indeed this season.
Brodie Chapman is looking v. at home at Trek