CYCLING
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LAUREN Kitchen continued her strong form in round two of the Women's World Tour on Sunday when she finished eighth in The Ronde van Drenthe in The Netherlands.
Kitchen finished fourth in the bunch sprint to finish eighth in the race, making this her third top 10 result in 10 days.
"I'm really happy with eighth today and to be honest I didn't feel great because I found the cobbles hard and suffered more then I would have liked, but that makes this result even more encouraging heading into the next World Tour races," she said.
"My teammates rode 100 per cent for me and I am really thankful for their support. I think we have a respectable result and I am looking forward to continuing the good feeling in the team in the next races."
The 138 kilometre race was vastly different to round one in Tuscany last weekend with long cobble stone sections, wind and a short man-made climb over a rubbish tip being the main obstacles in a majorly flat course.
Kitchen said it was always a tough race because of the distance covered.
"It is quite long for us and I think one of the longest races we have all year; the race is always on small roads and it is very nervous in the bunch and is always a fight to be at the front, particularly before the key cobble stone sections."
The race split apart on the cobbles with a break of four going clear with 70 kilometres still to go.
However, this strong break had nearly all the major teams represented and stayed away until the end with Chantel Blaak of Boels Dolmans taking the win.
Kitchen will lined up again on Monday in Drentse 8, a UCI 1.2 race in The Netherlands before a week of preparation for round three of the World Tour in Italy next Sunday.