Rüegg bests UAE in thrilling sprint showdown
The 126.5km course from Norwood to Campbelltown included two ascents of the race’s longest and steepest hill, the category 1 climb to Corkscrew Road (2.5km @ 8.3%). However, the stage ended with a 5km descent to the line, and it was there Rüegg proved to be the best, beating half of the UAE Team ADQ in the final sprint.
Four riders came over the final climb in front of the peloton, Rüegg, 42-year-old Mavi García, Paula Blasi and Dominika Włodarczyk (all UAE Team ADQ), thanks in large part to the work done by the defending champion’s teammates to bring her back to the UAE trio after the first Corkscrew ascent. Her rivals tried to triple-team her on the final km, but she was simply the freshest rider at crunch time and easily powered past them in the final 100 meters.
“Honestly, I can’t believe it. I’m totally overwhelmed,” Rüegg said after the race. “We wanted to defend the title, but it is always harder to defend. My team was amazing; they believed in me more than I [did]. Magdeleine [Vallieres] was amazing, and I didn’t believe it was possible after the first climb. I played the game and, yeah, I’m super stoked. I knew they would attack me; it was the only chance they had. I just had to follow immediately; I knew I had a good sprint. They kind of did the lead-out for me, which was good.”
It was a typically hot January day in Australia, with temperatures around 30° Celsius (86°F) when the stage got under way. After a tumultuous opening, Carina Schrempf (Fenix–Premier Tech) and Mikayla Harvey (SD Worx–Protime) broke away and led until the first of the two Corkscrew climbs, when the GC battle broke out. Race leader Ally Wollaston (FDJ United–Suez), who had sprinted to victories in the first two stages, fell back immediately. Włodarczyk, García and Sarah Van Dam (Visma–Lease a Bike) eventually opened a gap on the climb, with five riders, including Rüegg and Valieres, in the chase.
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The UAE riders then worked hard to drop Van Dam, as Włodarczyk rode away and up Corkscrew on her own, with Valieres doing super work in leading the chasers on the ascent. Eventually, Rüegg got to the front with Biasi and García, setting up a thrilling finale. The final GC results were carbon copies of the stage 3 finish, with García finishing second, Biasi third and Włodarczyk fourth.
Wollaston doubles her pleasure in sprints
Wollaston’s victory on stage 2, in temperatures up to 35°C, was no less exciting, as the final kilometer was all uphill and came after Van Dam tried to upstage the sprinters with an all-out attack with 1.5km left to ride. But Wollaston kept her cool and her teammates provided a perfect lead-out as she unleashed an irresistible sprint to beat… Rüegg, who clearly has sprinting chops.
“It was bloody tough that route, yeah, was a really tough day out there,” Wollaston said. “But [my rivals] put a lot of pressure on our team to chase in the final and there was a very, very strong breakaway. So we’re lucky that we had the strength to bring it back, but it was pretty touch-and-go there.”
The Aussie’s GC lead after stage 2 was 14 seconds over Josie Nelson (Picnic PostNL) and 17 seconds over Rüegg, with Włodarczyk and García at 24 seconds.
For a while, the very flat Stage 1 137.4km course in and around Willunga looked as if it would be taken by Alessia Vigilia (Uno-X Mobility), who took off on a solo breakaway with 99km left to ride and eventually led by more than 3 minutes at the beginning of the last of two finishing laps. She was nearly caught by the chasing group about 9km before the finish, but found another gear. But then she visibly tired on the long straight to the finish and was swallowed by the peloton just 300m from the line, eventually finishing 47th, 21 seconds adrift. Woolaston surged out of the pack and easily won the ragged bunch sprint.
But the last word belongs to the courageous Vigilia: “If the race was a kilometer shorter, that would have been better.”
Top 10 of the 2026 Women’s Santos Women’s Tour Down Under
- Noemi Rüegg, EF Education–Oatly 10:27:36
- Mavi García, UAE Team ADQ +0:11
- Paula Biasi, UAE Team ADQ +0:14
- Dominika Włodarczyk, UAE Team ADQ +0:17
- Sarah Van Dam, Visma–Lease a Bike +0:25
- Nina Buijsman, Human Powered Health +0:29
- Amanda Spratt, Lidl-Trek “
- Ella Wyllie, Liv AlUla Jayco “
- Mireia Benito, AG Insurance–Soudal “
- Lotte Claes, Fenix–Premier Tech “
