Tour de France Femmes Stage 2: Wiebes Bolsters Maillot Jaune with Another Win

Lorena Wiebes gave yet another reminder she is the best bunch sprinter in women’s cycling, winning stage 2 of the Tour de France Femmes Avec Zwift in style on Sunday.

The SD Worx-Protime rider launched inside the final 200 meters, accelerating hard on the right hand side of the road and opening an immediate and growing gap. Elisa Balsama (Lidl-Trek) was second with Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease a Bike) third.

The stage finale to Geneva was lit up by a 39km solo breakaway by Riejanne Markus (Lidl-Trek), who opened a gap of over one minute but was chased down by Wiebes team and finally caught inside the final 500 meters.

Wiebes’ ten second time bonus for winning sees her increase her lead over Kim Le Court (AG Insurance-Soudal) to 14 seconds. 2023 race winner Demi Vollering (FDJ United-Suez) stays third but is now 16 seconds back.

Wiebes wore yellow before in the race but this is her first time winning in the maillot jaune.

“It makes it for sure special, but also because again our team SD Worx Protime was working really hard for it,” she said.

“The girls were chasing full, full gas in the final to bring back Riejanne Markus. Then it is even more beautiful to finish it off in yellow.”

Markus puts in a huge effort

Stage two of the Tour de France Femmes was 147.9km from Aigle, the home of the UCI, to Geneva. It had more climbing meters than Saturday’s opening stage but as the conclusion was flatter, was seen as even better for the sprinters. That made it a tough task for attackers but some riders were certain to try.

Eline Jansen (Volkerwessels), Yuliia Biriukova (Laboral Kutxa-Fundación Euskadi) and Carlota Cipressi (Human Powered Health) shook off the peloton’s gravity 54km after the start and were joined very soon after that by Ema Comte (Cofidis) and Anouska Koster (Uno-X Mobility).

They had 2:05 atop the Côte de Cossonay, the third of the day’s five climbs and coming almost exactly the halfway point of the stage Comte was first there while Biriukova took the intermediate sprint ahead of Jansen soon afterwards.

Koster beat Comte to the top of the next climb while behind the SD Worx Team of race leader Wiebes started driving the bunch to reduce the 1: 15 gap.

Biriukova and Cipressi were dropped, leaving Koster, Compte and Jansen out front. They raced onto the Côte de Mont-sur-Rolle, where French national champion Célia Gery (FDJ United – Suez) attacked with Nina Berton (EF Education-Oatly) one kilometer from the summit and closed to within 15” at the top.

They got across, as did Sarah Van Dam (Visma | Lease a Bike), Amanda Spratt (Lidl-Trek) and Sara Casasola (Fenix-Premier Tech). However the bunch was close and the group lost focus, with Comte deciding to go alone 40km out.

She had been out front for many kilometres at that point and had no answer when Riejanne Markus (Lidl-Trek) caught her very soon after that and then dropped her, beginning a long solo TT towards the line.

The Dutchwoman had 1:05 with 28km to go but, with SD Worx chasing hard, had just half that 10km from the line. Markus was finally hauled back inside the last 400 meters, with Wiebes lurking and then launching for yet another big victory.

She now has 133 career wins, more than Tadej Pogačar in the men’s peloton. Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease a Bike) has the most out of the all time women’s peloton, 259 victories, and will hope to improve on her third place in the days to come.