RISE FROM GRACE

A year ago you’d likely only have heard of Grace Brown if you’d been paying close attention. There had been victory in the 2018 Oceania time trial championship and the Australian title the following year. There was a stage win at the Tour Down Under the next season, and a couple of months later she was off the front in the freezing rain of Ronde van Drenthe. But it was only last autumn that she really stepped into the limelight.

Attacking on the Roche-aux-Faucons, 16km from the finish of last year’s Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the 28-year-old Australian began to take chunks from Lizzie Deignan’s one-minute advantage. It was a nail-biting final as Brown closed the Trek-Segafredo