PARIS: Australia’s Grace Brown stormed to her first Olympic gold in the women’s individual time trial raced over 32.4km of rain-slicked Paris streets on Saturday.
The 32-year-old finished 1min 31sec ahead of Britain’s Anna Henderson with world champion Chloe Dygert snatching third after a nasty fall, less than a second off silver.
“It means so much. Being away from Australia a lot of the year, being away from my family, that’s given me the impetus to work really hard and make it all worth it,” said Brown.
US rider Dygert is also racing the road race and track events and took her final corners with particular care, rather than racing out of them.
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“I love these conditions to be honest,” Dygert said. “If this had been England it would have been perfect. I fell, that’s cycling, you have to get up.”
“I’ve been very blessed,” she added. “God has given me the ability to overcome a lot of obstacles.”
Competing in her final season, Brown came fourth in the same event at the Tokyo Games.
“Coming fourth in Tokyo showed me the roadmap, then second at the worlds, this is one better,” said the Australian.
“I’ve been second a lot but this was the good one to win I think.”
A day after a prolonged downpour drenched the opening ceremony, lighter rain persisted, adding an edge of danger to the race through the streets of the French capital.
Czech rider Julia Kopecky finished down the rankings and admitted the course was frightening.
“I fell and it hurt I can tell you,” the 19-year-old told AFP at the finish line.
“The crowd motivated me to finish fast,” she said, adding the road race next Saturday was her target.
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Ellen van Dijk of the Netherlands was expected to challenge for a medal but came 11th, having broken an ankle while training in Spain last month after returning to competition after having a baby in October.
Lotte Kopecky of Belgium also hit the deck hard in treacherous conditions.
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“Because it was wet, we had to go a bit slower through the corners and that helped me take some little breaks along the way. I didn’t really know that a lot of my competitors were crashing,” Brown said.
“So it sounds like I was lucky to stay upright in the end. Sometimes that is just bad luck, or luck to me this time. So I’m glad that was the case for me. And I’m sorry for my competitors.”
Brown revealed fans had warned her of the danger posed by a certain part of the course.
“At one corner the spectators were telling me to really slow down. So I had a feeling that maybe some people had (crashed), but I didn’t know that there were so many.”
Brown is enjoying a fine year, winning the national time-trial championships and the Liege-Bastogne-Liege one-day classic, but said this was the highlight of her career.
“Just to make Australia proud, winning the first gold medal for our nation,” she said.
“Setting the medal table on its way. I hope I inspire the other athletes to push their limits and go after similar results.”
Annemiek van Vleuten, Marlen Reusser and Anna van der Breggen, the three women ahead of Brown at the Tokyo Games, were all absent from the start line in Paris.
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