Tour de France Femmes Stage 5: Vollering Outkicks Reusser and Niewiadoma, Ferrand-Prévot Flounders

Demi Vollering (FDJ United-Suez) outsprinted Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM) and Marlen Reusser (Movistar) on stage 5 of the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift in a day that blew open the general classification.

Reusser defended the yellow jersey Wednesday despite Vollering and her teammates dominating the final of a brutal climb-fest in the Beaujolais.

However, this stage wreaked havoc on several key pre-race favorites behind them.

Pauline Ferrand-Prévot‘s hope at a title defense all but disappeared Wednesday.

The Frenchwoman was gapped by Vollering’s relentless pressure on the penultimate climb of the day and finished 2:35 minutes back. Clearly the Visma-Lease a Bike leader’s disaster TT on Tuesday was a warning of things to come.

The UAE L’Imad duo of Elisa Longo Borghini and Paula Blasi also suffered damaging losses Wednesday, as did Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime).

Vollering didn’t drop Reusser like she would have hoped with a volley of attacks in the final hour of racing on this 5th stage. However, the Dutchwoman looked by far the most assured rider in the race.

The 29-year-old hailed the work of her teammates after FDJ United-Suez worked a multi-rider play by putting satellite riders in the break as well as holding workers for Vollering in the main group.

“Today it was a really cool race. The whole team, every single rider was part of it, and I enjoy those victories the most,” Vollering said at the finish. “The way I managed to win that sprint, I thought I was not going to make it, it was really fast to the finish line.”

Is the Tour de France Femmes now a three-rider race?

The result Wednesday carved huge gaps in the overall and underlined who the true contenders are for the final yellow jersey.

Reusser leads Vollering by 12 seconds ahead of the huge climb of Mont Ventoux on stage 7 on Friday. Niewiadoma is third overall at 1:17.

But from there, the gap to fourth is huge. Niewiadoma’s teammate Antonia Niedermaier is fourth at 2:40. Dominika Włodarczyk (UAE L’Imad) is fifth at 2:54.

And defending champion PFP? She’s got a near-impossible five minutes to make up in the mountains.

Vollering said at the finish she’s not going to assume she’s got the upper hand on Reusser, a diesel engine powerhouse who will be put to the test Friday on Mont Ventoux.

“I’ve won the Tour and so has Kasia, and Marlen is the one who’s never managed to win, so she has to work for it,” Vollering said Wednesday. “It will be a hard battle, because she [Reusser] is a rider you cannot beat easily. I will try everything to do that.”

An Ardennes-style bruiser in French wine country

Stage 5 of the Tour de France Femmes was touted as one of the most important stages of the race.

Only the stage 4 TT and stage 7 to Ventoux was hyped as much as Wednesday’s leg-burner in the Beaujolais.

Wednesday’s 140km stage stacked eight categorized climbs amassing 2,900m of gain into an Ardennes-style parcours. Much of the climbing was loaded into the front half of the stage.

A sting in the tail was delivered courtesy of two steep climbs in the final 30km.

Ferrand-Prevot’s title defense fades

It took more than 60km of racing for the decisive break of the day to split from the bunch. All the major GC teams got at least one domestique into the dangerous 16-rider move.

The break was strong and worked well, but Vollering and FDJ United-Suez had a plan.

The Dutchwoman and her teammate Celia Gery lit up the reduced peloton on the Cat 3. Col de Durbize at 30km to go.

Van der Breggen was gapped first before Ferrand-Prévot lost the wheels. Longo Borghini also began struggling before her teammate “#freeBlasi” Paula Blasi dropped back to help.

Movistar and FDJ United-Suez then dropped breakaway riders Lianne Lippert and Franziska Koch back to the small GC group in a tactical master-move. The two superdomestiques piled on at the front of the classification group to support Reusser and Vollering and drive the wedge into their rivals.

Vollering can’t get rid of Reusser

Vollering was relentlessly aggressive on the steep final climb of Mont Brouilly. The former Tour de France winner surged multiple times on the 3km hill but couldn’t get the gap on Reusser and Niewiadoma.

Powerhouse TT rider Reusser had to dig deep to hang on to the two top climbers on the 8 percent grades and only narrowly kept in contact before the flat 8km final.

Vollering, Reusser, and Niewiadoma pulled through as a trio toward the finish as they settled in for a 3-up sprint.

Niewiadoma tried to spring a surprise on her faster-finishing rivals by accelerating early at around 300m to go, but Vollering caught her wheel and kicked past for the win.

Tour de France Femmes stage 5 results