Cycling: Gold for Bronzini after crash robs Armitstead

Paul Short
Saturday 24 September 2011 17:20 EDT
Comments

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

Italy's Giorgia Bronzini defended her women's road race world title in a sprint finish as a crash ruined British hopes here yesterday.

Bronzini managed to outsprint Holland's Marianne Vos for gold after Canadian Clara Hughes's break was caught.

But a crash further back held up Lizzie Armitstead, robbing a well-set British team of a medal chance. Nicole Cooke finished fourth while Armitstead came seventh.

"I'm gutted. I felt good but got caught behind the crash," said Armitstead. "I felt so good all day but that's cycling, I guess. A girl came down in front of me after the girls had set me up perfectly, it's such a stupid way to lose it."

Cooke, the defending Olympic champion, said: "We were all riding for Lizzie. She had been doing so well, and I was up there waiting for her to come up to me, but I never saw her. So in the end I had to just do my sprint.

"When we went around the last corner I thought, 'Well, I'm in a race-winning position, Lizzie's either on my wheel or she's not.'

"We're all pretty honest in the team and we want someone from the team to win, it doesn't matter who in the end. If she saw me in that position she'd want me to go for it, positions like that don't just come along."

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in