The competition for the overall women's road World Cup title tightened up Saturday after the Montreal round, the seventh in the season-long series. Judith Arndt (T-Mobile) took a closely contested win over series leader Nicole Cooke (Univega) to move to within 49 points of the lead. Oenone Wood (Nurnberger Versicherung) did not race in Montreal and is now a distant third in the standings, with the World Cup fast becoming a battle between Cooke and Arndt.

The traditional circuit added a 1km false-flat section along the base of the main climb, with the number of laps correspondingly reduced from the usual 12 to 11. However, the race still came down to the 3km climb up Mont Royal.

As usual, the top teams set a strong tempo, and the peloton began to shed riders on the first lap, with a core group of 35 riders still in contention by the halfway point - one-third of the original starters. The top riders made the split, including Arndt, Cooke, Kristin Armstrong (Lipton), Annette Beutler (Elk Haus No), Christine Thorburn (Webcor-Platinum) and Erinne Willock (Webcor-Platinum), Trixi Worrack (Nurnberger-Versicherung), Edwige Pitel (Équipe mixte Pruneaux d'Agen - Bianchi Aliverti Kookai) and Élisabeth Chevanne Brunel (Équipe mixte Pruneaux d'Agen - Bianchi Aliverti Kookai).

Thorburn, Willock and Beutler took over the pacesetting, until Nurnberger Versicherung sent Tina Liebig up the road on the ninth lap. When her lead went over half a minute, three riders took up the chase, with one of the three - Élodie Touffet (Nobili Rubinetterie Menikini) - bridging to Liebig. Touffet quickly dropped Liebig and by the start of the last lap had 90 seconds on the peloton.

"The gap was never big enough to worry us," said Arndt after the race. "Of course she could have won, anything can happen, but it would have been a surprise. We knew we could catch her."

Indeed, Touffet was reeled back midway through the last climb as the peloton fractured, with Arndt and Cooke riding away from the rest of the field. Kristin Armstrong outsprinted Beutler for third. Willock finished sixth, Sue Palmer-Komar (Canada-Colavita) seventh and Thorburn eighth.

"This course is one of the most difficult in the World Cup, and this victory is important. There are a lot of people watching and it shows I can still perform at the top," said Arndt.

Race note
Sue Palmer-Komar suggested that Genevieve Jeanson managed to affect the race even after her retirement: "Nobody knew what to expect with Genevieve (Jeanson) not here, but it ended up the same - a few tried (to attack), but the pack did not react; no one was able to get away and it came down to the climb."