Tour de France Women 2024: The favourites for the yellow jersey in the TOUR-Check

The most important facts in brief

• 3rd Tour de France Femmes, 12 to 18 August 2024
• Seven days of racing with eight stages, totalling 949.7 km
• Maximum 154 participants: 22 teams of seven racers each
• The previous winners: 2022 Annemiek van Vleuten (Netherlands); 2023 Demi Vollering (Netherlands)

The TOUR favourites by stars

***** Demi Vollering

*** Katarzyna "Kasia" Niewiadoma, Gaia Realini

** Neve Bradbury, Mavi Garcia, Juliette Labous, Evita Muzic

* Yara Kastelijn, Cedrine Kerbaol, Riejanne Markus, Pauliena Rooijakkers

The route: few time trials, lots of mountains

If you want to assess the chances of the favourites, you have to take a look at the route: The third edition of the Tour de France Femmes offers a lot of metres in altitude, two Alpine stages and very few kilometres in the individual time trial. An advantage for extremely strong climbers. After the international start in Rotterdam, it begins with two flat stages in the Netherlands. This is followed by a short individual time trial (6.3 kilometres) on the second day of the race - there have never been so few kilometres in the battle against the clock in three editions. The race continues to France on sections of the well-known spring classics Amstel Gold Race and Liège-Bastogne-Liège in Belgium (stage 4). Medium-difficult hilly sections await there. Sections in northern France (5th) and through the foothills of the Vosges mountains into the French Jura (6th).

>> All stages at a glance

>> Start list: The line-ups at a glance

>> TV broadcast & live stream

Final in Alpe d'Huez

The overall victory will then be decided by the two Alpine stages. The seventh stage leads to the stage finish in Le Grand-Bornand. At 167 kilometres, it will be the longest stage of the day with an additional 3000 metres of climbing. On the following day, the King's or Queen's stage awaits as the finale with 3748 metres of climbing. From Le Grand-Bornand, the route leads over the 1923 metre high Col du Glandon (the last eight kilometres have an average gradient of 8.8 percent) to the legendary climb to Alpe d'Huez. It is highly likely that the stage winner will also be able to celebrate overall victory in the third edition of the Tour de France Femmes. It is the only stage on which very large time gaps are to be expected.

Bauernfeind, van Vleuten, Kopecky and Longo Borghini will be missing

Who could be the overall winner given the course profile? Annemiek van Vleuten, winner of the 2022 Tour premiere, has ended her career after finishing fourth overall last year. World champion Lotte Kopecky, who finished second overall last year, has also decided not to start because she wants to compete in the omnium competition on the track at the Olympic Games in Paris the day before the Tour starts. Elisa Longo Borghini, the Giro winner, also had to cancel at short notice after a training crash. A particular pity from a German perspective: Ricarda Bauernfeind, last year's stage winner and ninth overall in the Tour de France Femmes, has cancelled her start for this year due to knee problems.

The favourites in detail

***** Demi Vollering (Netherlands/Team SD Worx - Protime)

Will Alpe d'Huez become the Dutchwoman's mountain? Last year's winner Demi Vollering must be considered the top favourite. The strongest all-rounder in women's cycling is hard to beat in top form. However, she failed to win a medal at the Olympic Games in Paris - the penultimate week before the Tour. Overall, the 27-year-old Dutchwoman does not seem to be in the same form as last year. Back then, she looked as if she could succeed her retired compatriot Annemiek van Vleuten as a serial winner. Due to the absence of team-mate and last year's runner-up Lotte Kopecky, who prioritised the track events at the Olympics over the Tour, she does not have to share the leading role at Team SD Worx - at least not in terms of the overall standings. However, the Belgian racing team will probably be taking Lorena Wiebes with them to France - so the five riders will have to divide their energies between the fight for the overall classification and sprint preparation. Not ideal.

*** Katarzyna "Kasia" Niewiadoma (Poland/Canyon//SRAM Racing)

Last year's third-placed finisher is without doubt one of the best classification riders in the women's peloton and is the German team Canyon//SRAM's hope for a podium finish. Last year, the 29-year-old Polish rider was the best climber on the Tourmalet Pass after Vollering. She looks as if she has improved further on the climbs and worked on her explosiveness - perhaps also thanks to training with her partner Taylor Phinney, an American ex-pro whose mother Connie Carpenter-Phinney was the first female Olympic road race winner in 1984. Niewiadoma's riding style can sometimes seem impetuous - but you have to organise your strength well during the seven stages and also be vigilant on the moderately difficult stages. Advantage: the few time trial kilometres. Last year, she lost second place overall to Lotte Kopecky in the final battle against the clock.

*** Gaia Realini (Italy/Lidl-Trek)

1.50 metres and 40 kilograms - no one among the favourites needs so few watts for a climb. This brings advantages on long and steep climbs. The 23-year-old Italian is the absolute lightweight in the peloton and is now Lidl-Trek's trump card following Elisa Longo Borghini's cancellation at short notice. Realini proved her class last year when she finished third overall in the Vuelta a Espana, Giro d'Italia and the Tour de l'Avenir junior competition. The biggest challenge for Realini in her Tour debut is likely to be the first two flat stages in the Netherlands, where the peloton could be blown away by the wind - and lightweights tend to be at a disadvantage. Her time will come in the high mountains at the mountain finishes in Le Grand Bornand and especially in Alpe d'Huez.

** Neve Bradbury (Australia/Canyon//SRAM Racing)

The 50-kilo lightweight from Melbourne could be the surprise of this year's Tour. She celebrated her breakthrough into the absolute world elite of female climbers at the Giro d'Italia last July. She won the tough mountain finish on the Blockhaus and finished third in the overall standings behind winner Elisa Longo Borghini and second-placed world champion Lotte Kopecky. If, in addition to the expected role of helper for captain Kasia Niewiadoma, she is given some freedom, she could seize her chance for success at her first Tour start.

** Margarita Victoria "Mavi" Garcia (Spain/Liv AIUla Jayco)

The Spaniard switched from duathlon to professional cycling late in her career. In the combination of running and cycling, the Spaniard was twice a world championship medallist. The now 40-year-old is one of the best climbers in the peloton. However, her history with the Tour de France Femmes has not been successful so far: in her first year in 2022, she lost a lot of time after a collision with her team car, and last year she did not compete in the final stage due to illness.

** Juliette Labous (France/Team dsm-firmenich PostNL)

In the men's race, the French have been waiting for a home victory since 1985. Not since Bernard Hinault has a Frenchman finished at the top of the Tour. In the women's race, the most promising candidate at the moment is Juliette Labous. The 25-year-old from Montfaucon has already finished fourth in the Tour (2022) and third in the Giro (2023). In Team dsm, however, she will have to share the helpers with top sprinter Charlotte Kool, who is expected to be Lorena Wiebes' main challenger in the battle for sprint victories and the green jersey. It will be her last appearance for Team dsm for the time being. She will be moving back home to Equipe FDJ-Suez for the coming season.

** Evita Muzic (France/FDJ-Suez)

Even before the start of the Tour, the Frenchwoman has had by far the best season of her career to date. The 25-year-old from Team FDJ-Suez is likely to start the race as the leader of her team. Team-mate Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig does not appear to be in top form after injury. Muzic set an exclamation mark at the Vuelta (Tour of Spain) at the beginning of May when she beat the eventual overall winner and Tour favourite Demi Vollering to win the stage at the mountain arrival at Laguna Negra.

* The outsiders

Women's cycling is currently developing very quickly - also in view of the new appeal of the Tour de France Femmes. New faces are appearing. Among them Riejanne Markus from Team Visma | Lease a Bike with Marianne Vos. The 27-year-old Dutchwoman has been one of the best climbers since her strong performances at this year's Vuelta. Her disadvantage: with only 6.3 kilometres to race against the clock, the strong time trial specialist will have few opportunities to gain time on her rivals in this Tour. Even her compatriots former European cross champion Yara Kastelijn and fourth overall in the Giro d'Italia Pauliena Rooijakkers (both Fenix-Deceuninck) should keep an eye on her opponents. The French could take particular pleasure in the 23-year-old Breton Cedrine Kerbaol have. The young rider from the German team Ceratizit-WNT showed her potential last year when she won the young rider classification for the white jersey. The 19-year-old compatriot is pushing from behind Marion Bunelwho is currently still riding for the small French team St Michel - Mavic - Auber93 WE.