| 2016 Strade Bianche Donne | |
| Date: | 5 March 2016 |
| Series: | 2016 UCI Women's World Tour |
| Race No: | 1 |
| Season No: | 17 |
| Stages: | 1 |
| Distance: | 121 |
| Unit: | km |
| Time: | 3h 30' 13" |
| Speed: | 34.535 |
| First: | Lizzie Armitstead |
| First Nat: | GBR |
| Second: | Katarzyna Niewiadoma |
| Second Nat: | POL |
| Third: | Emma Johansson |
| Third Nat: | SWE |
| Previous: | 2015 |
| Next: | 2017 |
The second edition of the women's Strade Bianche was held on 5 March 2016, in Tuscany, Italy. British world champion Lizzie Armitstead won the race, in bad weather, ahead of Katarzyna Niewiadoma and Emma Johansson.[1]
The women's Strade Bianche served as the first event of the inaugural UCI Women's World Tour, the highest level of professional women's cycling.[2] [3] The race is organized on the same day as the men's event, at a shorter distance, but on much of the same roads.[3]
The Strade Bianche is a one day cycling race starting in and finishing in Siena,[3] notorious for its long sections of white gravel roads (sterrati or strade bianche in Italian). The course runs over hilly terrain in the province of Siena, for a total of 121 km, featuring seven sectors and 22.4 km of dirt roads.[3] [4] Six sectors were in common with the men's route.[5] The race finished on Siena's Piazza del Campo, after a narrow ascent on the roughly-paved Via Santa Caterina in the heart of the medieval city.