Orica Scott’s Annemiek van Vleuten was announced the Voxwoman rider of the year at the Rouleur Classic in London this evening.
The 35 year old Dutch star took the award at the end of a season that has seen her bag La Course, two stages of the Giro Rosa and the world time trial championship in Bergen.
Other wins this year include the Boels Rental Ladies Tour, the Dutch time trial championship and the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race.
Having topped a public vote to be the Voxwoman rider of the summer, a panel of pundits decided that Van Vleuten’s consistent showing between January and September also merited her taking the overall ‘Voxy Award’.
Also in the running were the spring round winner Coryn Rivera and autumn’s winner Chantal Blaak.
Read: Gold standard – Annemiek van Vleuten interview
Because she is currently in Poland for the opening round of the track World Cup, Van Vleuten -whose highly successful season followed a horrific downhill crash in the 2016 Rio Olympics road race finale- sent her thanks via a video message.
“It’s a big honour for me to win this award,” she said. “I’ve had a great season and it makes it more special if the fans also see this.”
Her compatriot and former team mate Iris Slappendel picked up the award for her.
“She’s a very inspiring team mate, very dedicated,” Slappendel said of Van Vleuten. “She has had a lot of difficulties and a lot of bad luck but she kept going and this is the first year she’s really got to show what she is capable of.
“I was super happy [to see her successes this summer]. I know she prepared specifically for…the Giro and La Course.
“And she has really changed herself to a climber. We saw that at the Olympics before she crashed. But she’s really found her potential this year.”
The Voxy Award was first awarded at last year’s Rouleur Classic and was won by Megan Guarnier.
The event -based at Victoria House in Bloomsbury- continues on Friday and Saturday.
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