The Women’s Tour de France final is set to be another nail-biting finish down to the seconds. The Dutch favourite, Demi Vollering, has claimed the Yellow Jersey with her victory on the penultimate stage and heads into Sunday’s final stage – which starts and finishes in Nice – with an eight-second lead over Poland’s Kasia Niewiadoma.
On the eighth stage, covering 171.9 kilometres from Sisteron to Nice, Vollering broke away with a sharp attack on the final climb and held on to a 17-second lead over Elisa Longo Borghini of Italy and Niewiadoma to the finish. Niewiadoma thus lost the Yellow Jersey, which she had only claimed the previous day with her victory on Mont Ventoux. Antonia Niedermaier from Rosenheim finished eleventh, 38 seconds behind, and successfully defended the White Jersey as the best young rider. She also sits in a strong fifth place overall.
A similar scenario to 2024?
This could see a repeat of the 2024 scenario. Back then, in a dramatic finale at the cycling mecca of Alpe d’Huez, Niewiadoma secured the Tour victory in the overall standings, finishing four seconds ahead of Vollering. Once again, the Women’s Tour is full of suspense right up to the final day – a scenario the men’s race currently cannot match. Slovenian world champion Tadej Pogacar has won the last three editions by a huge margin.
Meanwhile, the French defending champion, Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, has withdrawn ahead of the eighth stage. The 2024 Olympic mountain bike champion in Paris, who was languishing in 14th place in the general classification, almost 15 minutes behind, complained of feeling unwell.
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