Elisa Longo Borghini reaches Tour de France Femmes podium after sleepless nights: ‘I kept waking up at 3 a.m.’

Elisa Longo Borghini succeeded in securing a podium finish at the Tour de France Femmes on Sunday. The Italian from UAE moved into third place at the expense of Marlen Reusser, who unfortunately crashed after already being dropped early in the stage and eventually slipped to 14th overall.

Longo Borghini admitted to Eurosport that she had not been having her best day. “I was just telling Paula (Blasi, who finished fifth, ed.) that I thought I was completely empty, but actually it wasn’t quite as bad as I thought.”

“On the tough climbs, I managed not to lose too much time to Demi [Vollering] and Kasia [Niewiadoma], and I was able to get back to Fisher-Black,” the Italian explained.

“After that, we tried to keep Niedermaier under control,” she said of the rider who eventually finished fourth. “I worked well with Paula, who did a huge amount of work on the front all the way to the top of the climb. I tried to make sure Antonia couldn’t attack, and we controlled the chasing group so that Niedermaier stayed calm.”

“When we caught Kasia again, we decided to sprint for Paula. And well, then I crashed in the finale... There always has to be some drama, of course, a little bit of bad luck,” Longo Borghini laughed.

“Honestly, I don’t have the words. I never expected to finish on the podium after that fifth stage and after the time trial. It really is amazing,” said Longo Borghini, before revealing that the time trial is still playing on her mind.

“I really just want to go home now, be with my family, lie down on the couch and sleep for a week. Over the past few days, I kept waking up at 3 a.m., thinking about the time trial, about stage 5, about this and about that...” she sighed in Nice.