Hayley Simmonds bounced back from her disappointing ride at the Time Trial World Championships by taking second place at Chrono des Nations on Sunday.
The British time trialling supremo could only ride to 25th at the Worlds in Doha a little under a fortnight ago, citing changes to her bike that affected her aerodynamics and actually made her bike fall foul of UCI regulations.
Her ride in Qatar was some way short of her expectations and her ability, but she replicated her domestic form in France when she was just 37 seconds shy of winning one of the iconic time trials.
Belgium’s Ann-Sophie Duyck rode the 20.9km course in the fastest time of 28:55, with Finland’s Lotta Lepistö beaten to second place by Simmonds.
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A measure of Simmonds’s performance was that Duyck came eighth in the Worlds TT, and Lepistö 11th, just days before she claimed bronze in the road race. Amber Neben, this year’s time trial world champion, won the Chrono des Nations in 2011.
In the men’s race, second and third in this year’s time trial Worlds took the top two spots. Team Sky‘s Vasil Kiryienka won for the second successive year, with Movistar’s Jonathan Castroviejo five seconds adrift.
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Ireland’s Ryan Mullen, who spent more than an hour in the lead of the World Championships TT before finishing fifth, was 30 seconds off a podium, with Denmark’s Martin Toft Madsen riding to third ahead of the Cannondale-Drapac rider.
Mullen has previously won the U23 event twice, a title that Alex Dowsett has also won. David Millar won the men’s race in 2010.
