Zoe Bäckstedt claims crushing win in Worlds U23 women's time trial
Zoe Bäckstedt absolutely dominated the Women's under-23 time trial winning by 1:50 as the Briton added to her multi-disciplined rainbow jersey collection.
It was day two of the festival of road cycling in Rwanda, after the elite time trials on Sunday, with the under-23 categories getting the limelight.
The women's under-23 time trial parcours saw riders undertake a 22.6km effort with 350 metres of elevation gain.
From the off, Alena Ivanchenko set the benchmark of the day setting a time of 33:18 at the finish with an average speed of 40.7 kph, and she was clear by a significant margin over the earlier riders of the day.
More riders began to finish their efforts with Alli Anderson (Australia) coming the closest to Ivanchenko, but still was 30 seconds down at the finish on the set time of Ivanchenko.
It wasn't soon after that Alena Ivanchenko time in the hotseat came to an end as Viktoria Chladoňová (Slovakia) blitzed to the line with a speed of 41.3kph, with the Slovak 31 seconds quicker than Ivanchenko's benchmark time.
2023 junior time trial champion Felicity Wilson-Haffenden (Australia) flew out of the convention centre, scorching all of the previously set times at the first two intermediate checks on the day. She was 33 seconds faster than Chladoňová through the second intermediate, but she couldn't hold it. Chladoňová's final third was excellent with Wilson-Haffenden finishing 30 seconds down on the mark.
The big pre-race favourite was top multi-disciplined talent and current British women's team trial champion. Zoe Bäckstedt. The 20-year old got off to a stormer, moving clear of the competition through the the first time check and that continued throughout the course as she cruised to the line, winning by 1:51 over Chladoňová and and 2:11 over Federica Venturelli (Italy).
