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Maëva Squiban has won two stages in two days, tamed medium mountains and punchy climbs, and nailed descents. Has France just found a future home winner of the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift?
Prior to this week not too many people were familiar with Squiban. She had won a couple of races before, and was second in a stage of the Femmes last year, but the Breton 23-year-old certainly wasn’t on many people’s lips.
But two back-to-back wins, one in the Massif Central and one on the outskirts of the Alps, has got France excited. “I think we know who she is now: Maëva Squiban,” her UAE Team ADQ sports director Cherie Pridham said.
Damn right we do.
“I said it yesterday: we’re not finished yet, but I didn’t quite think it was going to happen again today,” Pridham added, speaking after her rider’s latest success. “But Maëva was confident this morning, saying that she wanted to go from kilometer zero.
“We said: ‘kilometer zero is a long way’, but then she was there and we held her back a little bit. We knew when she was on the climb we could let her fly.
“What a sensation, an absolute sensation. She’s Maëva Squiban, and we have one of the best climbers here in the world. It’s absolutely stunning.”
“It’s a dream, an amazing feeling,” she had said after her stage 6 victory. “I didn’t expect to do that. I was already happy to climb onto the podium for the combativity prize in Brittany.
“It was a special moment for me because it was on my training roads and I had all my family there, but today is a really special, special moment. It’s definitely the greatest victory of my career.”
She had predicted that “maybe they’ll let me go a little less now”, but just a day later she went up the road again, attacked on the upper slopes of the final climb and then descended expertly to win in Chambéry. “I think now I’ll have a few more people watching me,” she laughed.
Future yellow jersey? ‘I like to have fun on the bike, I don’t like to focus on GC’
Maëva Squiban is now the focus of a lot of attention (Photo: Getty)
According to Pridham, the diminutive, bespectacled and softly-spoken Squiban goes by the nickname of “little pocket rocket”. “She’s super fun, too,” Pridham added. “She loves French rap, and she drives us crazy with her French rapping, but we love her. I’m speechless.”
With two stages to go, Squiban is 16th in the GC, seven minutes adrift of the yellow jersey Kim Le Court. She won’t win yellow this year, but what about in the future?
She can climb, descend, time trial (she’s won a handful of TTs and is regularly in the top-10 of others) and outthink her competitors – all the necessary characteristics of a GC champion.
“Never say never,” Pridham said. “We know she’s pretty good at time trialling, and now we know what we’re capable of doing with Maëva. We need to go back to the drawing board and have a look at how we’ll progress, but one day at a time.”
Does the woman of the hour agree? “I don’t know. I like to attack to, have fun on the bike. I don’t like to focus on GC.
“I’ve had two exceptional days, today and yesterday, and if I am here for the GC, I have to stay in the bunch and wait. But I really like to attack. Maybe one day I will try to fight for the GC, but actually I still want to have fun on my bike and to try something.”
Maëva Squiban has arrived – she’ll make sure you won’t forget her name.
Also read:
Incredible stage at the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift with a repeat winner, a dropped yellow jersey and an incredible fightback
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