Robert Gesink may be proud of the fact that he has won his third straight Dutch Cyclist of the Year award but he is still two years behind Marianne Vos, who has won it for the fifth consecutive year. The 23-year-old Nederland Bloeit rider has taken the prize every year since she burst onto the scene to take the 2006 World Championships on the roads of Salzburg, Austria.
2010 was yet another dominant year for Vos, which began with the successful defence of her World cyclocross title in the snow of Tábor, Czech Republic. After a short break she returned to the road at the Trofeo Binda in Cittiglio, Italy, and started her World Cup defence campaign in perfect fashion with another victory; she took the World Cup leader’s jersey and managed to hold on to it right to the end of the competition, which she took for the third time.
She bounced back from the disappointment of second place in the Ronde van Vlaanderen with a dominant victory in the Gracia-Orlova stage race in the Czech Republic. Stage wins followed in the Tour de l’Aude, the Iurreta-Emakumeen Bira, and the Giro d’Italia; in the meantime she swapped her Dutch road race jersey for that of the time trial.
The end of Vos’ season began with a victory in the Holland Ladies Tour and a stage in the Giro della Toscana. Once again though, she was to be dissapointed in the World Championships, the biggest race of the year, where she was pipped on the line by Italian sprinter Giorgia Bronzini to be condemned to an unprecendented fourth consecutive silver medal.
Vos was chosen by a panel of Dutch journalists, ahead of teammate Annemiek Van Vleuten and Cervélo TestTeam super-sprinter Kirsten Wild. She was not present to accept the award in person as she is currently in Melbourne to take part in the Omnium at the track World Cup event next week.