Mia Griffin's crash at the Giro d'Italia denied her one of the only two chances for sprinters on the race and left her carrying an injury through the remainder of her first Grand Tour. Though she also went on to exit the event early, she was buoyed by the experience, saying it was a race she felt she could go back to and perform in.
She rode the event, for her World Tour team Roland, in her new Irish champion's jersey. She lined up against the best riders in the world, in the second biggest stage race in the world, where she told stickybottle power personal bests were required to get into good grupetto groups when the mountains split the race.
Looking back now, she said she felt she took it all in her stride, calling on something of a secret weapon; her Olympic experience from last year. Almost a year on, she believes the pressure cooker of Paris was "strengtening" and she is a better, more reslient, athelete for it. It would take a lot to faze 2025 Mia Griffin.
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"The Olympics was really crazy, with the media coverage that we got and everything," she said. "I'd never experienced anything like that before. And the pressure that came with that was huge. I was blown away by it, and a little bit overwhelmed in the weeks before the Olympics.
"And, of course, that in turn puts pressure on. But I think that experience was strengthening… You see you can just go and do your thing. And the other events after that don't seem as pressurised as the Olympics. You just take them in your stride. It's more normalised then."
She didn't feel too normal when she crashed hard onto the tarmac with 2.5km to go on stage 3; one of the many victims of a group crash just before the bunch sprint, won by Lorena Wiebes (Team SD Worx-Protime).
That resulted in lingering bruising on her glute, which hampered her through the remainder of the race. "That wasn't great, not exactly ideal," she said of facing into the mountain stages feeling a bit battered.
When the next sprinters' chance came, on stage 5, a 16-strong group of big name riders arived at the finish 1:42 clear of the bunch. Though Griffin won the bunch sprint for 17th place, she said in reality she was "sprinting for nothing". However, she felt very capable of navigating the peloton through the Giro.
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"It was similar to Tour de Suisse in the standard because Suisse was really, really hard," she said. "I think it's mainly the climbing standard; that's where the biggest stage races are really hard, especially for a rider like me who's not remotely a climber.
"Even just to get through those stages you have to suffer quite a long time to get into a nice groupetto. You have to nearly set (power PBs) for 20 minutes to be in a nice grouppetto. It's actually a crazy world… that's the standard of the girls now."
She said once stage 5 was complete, with no more chances for her to come, she continued to be impacted by her injury. In the interests of recovering, especially with a busy racing schedule ahead, the decision was made she would not start stage 7, the penultimate stage.
"I'm racing this Saturday in France, so it's a quick turnaround," she said of La Périgord Ladies, to be followed by La Picto-Charentaise on Sunday. "It doesn't make too much sense to go into a deep hole after crashing, and not to be able to get back out of it."
Asked what it was like to race in her new national road race champion's kit - after winning the title for the first time in Meath last month - she said "oh my God, it was so nice".
"But now I can't hide in the bunch, I have to be well placed from now on because people can see me so easily," she laughed. "I love the jersey and I'm happy that we did the orange on the sleeve… that we have the green, white and orange. It looks really good."
She added "every time" she was introduced to the crowd, with her team mates, at the start of the Giro stages the announcer whipped up the crowd announcing she was Irish champion, with the spectators very much entering into the spirit of it.
"They love it, they absolutely love having a national champion. Everyone loves Irish national champions, that's what I've learned. It's a really nice experience so far, I'm really enjoying it."
