It’s exhausting to think about a smoother transition into a brand new group than Sarah Roy had in Australia, lining as much as race on acquainted roads as highway captain of the EF Training-Oatly squad that claimed the very first Girls’s WorldTour race of the season – the Tour Down Beneath (TDU) – with Noemi Rüegg.
“Yeah, for positive, it has been a extremely profitable interval in Australia, it could not have began higher,” Roy instructed Cyclingnews in the beginning of the month on the sidelines of the Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race earlier than it started. “Profitable the TDU was actually nice morale for the group after which going into each race after.”
The outcomes of this have been quickly as soon as once more clear because the ProTeam made it to the rostrum once more on the one-day Girls’s WorldTour race with Rüegg, with Roy ever current as a priceless ally for the group. She and the group walked away from the Australian season with loads of motivation.
“We’ll simply preserve constructing on this,” mentioned Roy when requested concerning the plans for the yr forward. “I imply that is actually strong racing and actually aggressive, nevertheless it’s solely going to get extra aggressive in Europe nevertheless it’s a very nice strategy to begin.
“I feel the spirits are actually excessive however we’re very cognizant of the truth that we will not lose focus and we have to preserve the identical stage.”
Regardless of throwing herself into the duty of serving to ship sturdy outcomes for the group within the racing on the Tour Down Beneath, Roy was additionally personally inside the highest 20 by the one-day races.
Roy got here fifteenth on the Nationwide Championships criterium and eighth on the gruelling highway race regardless of being with out teammates. She was additionally fifteenth on the Schwalbe Girls’s One Day Traditional, 14th on the Surf Coast Traditional and she or he dug deep by the climbs of the ultimate circuit of the Cadel Evans Nice Ocean Highway Race to complete 18th at the same time as she helped Rüegg on her path to the rostrum. It’s a optimistic indicator of the sturdy type the rejuvenated 38-year-old is carrying into the subsequent a part of the season.
For Roy that subsequent block will start at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad this weekend, marking the beginning of the Classics season which is a realm Roy revels in.
Saturday’s Omloop is a race that the skilled Australian has tackled 9 instances already, ending twelfth final yr as she was the primary rider throughout the road for her squad of the time, Cofidis. This time she might be lining up in a group that’s backing Lotta Henttala and Nina Berton, as she kicks off her first Classics marketing campaign with EF Training-Oatly.
“I am actually trying ahead to all the Classics,” mentioned Roy. “I’ve had a tough couple of years so I actually wish to come again in a brand new means the place I can’t simply give again to the group within the captain position however really be within the finals of the races – not essentially getting outcomes or something though I imply, that will be nice – however simply to be part of the ultimate teams and a part of the motion on the very finish of races.”
Subscribe to Cyclingnews for limitless entry to our 2025 Spring Classics protection. Do not miss any of the breaking information, stories, and evaluation from all of the Cobbled Classics from Opening Weekend to Paris-Roubaix. Discover out extra.
