TOP STORY: Tour de France Femmes
2025 Tour de France news:
• 8 Teams Happy, 15 Without Results
• Prize Money At Le Tour
• Interesting Tour de France Statistics
• GC Gaps At The Tour de France 2025
Race news:
• Tour de France Femmes
• Tour of Britain Heads To Wales
Rider news:
• Two Soudal Quick-Step Extensions
TOP STORY: Tour de France Femmes
We are now just two days away from the Grand Départ of the Tour de France Femmes and all signs are pointing to an amazing race. This race is shaping up to be the most competitive edition yet with no time trials but plenty of climbing and attack opportunities. It’s going to be a thrilling nine days!
Best race of the season last year?
Teams have been busy making their roster announcements this week and the riders are now assembling in the Brittany region for Saturday’s first stage. The biggest GC names are of course:
• Kasia Niewiadoma‑Phinney (Canyon–SRAM) – The reigning champion was victorious by just 4 seconds last year and is laser‑focused on retaining her title. Strong team support and robust preparation make her a top threat.
• Demi Vollering (FDJ‑SUEZ) – Winner in 2023 and Vuelta champ in 2025, she’s back with determination after last year’s near miss from a crash.
• Marlen Reusser (Movistar) – Dominant in week-long races this season she’s carrying excellent form into the Tour.
• Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ) – Creative, aggressive, and consistent in both climbing and tactically strong, the recent Giro winner is a serious GC threat.
• Anna van der Breggen, Gaia Realini, and Pauline Ferrand‑Prévot also show promise—the latter fresh off a Paris–Roubaix win and making her Tour debut aiming for top placings.
Can Ferrand-Prévot be up there with the best in her début TDF?
Key Stages to Watch
• Early hilly stages in Bretagne (Stages 1–2) and mid‑race medium‑mountain days (Stages 5–7) will demand consistently strong performances to stay in GC contention and a misstep on one of these stages could easily see somebody’s GC run come to an end.
• Stage 8: Queen stage – Col de la Madeleine : The pivotal day, with nearly 3,500 m of climbing.
• Stage 9: Final‑mountain showdown – Joux Plane/Châtel : A brutal Alpine finale that’ll likely decide the podium — expect fireworks !
My predictions ?
1) Demi Vollering — sheer consistency, determination and climbing form make her my pick for the yellow jersey.
2) Marlen Reusser — if she handles the pressure and mountains, she could very well ride to yellow.
3) Kasia Niewiadoma‑Phinney — relentless and smart racer, very likely to challenge again but will be outgunned in the mountains by Vollering & Reusser.
Movistar’s Marlen Reusser – a serious contender this year for the final yellow
Happy Teams & Desperate Teams
We’re now deep into the 3rd week at Le Tour for the men and things are getting desperate for certain teams. With 23 teams on the startlist and 17 out of 21 stages run and done, we’ve had just eight winning teams. Soudal-Quickstep are having a great race despite Remco’s abandon with 4 stage victories, UAE have claimed 5, Alpecin – Deceuninck & Lidl-Trek both have 2 and EF, Uno-X, Ineos and Visma all have one each.
That leaves 15 teams with no victory yet and only 4 chances left. The prizemoney table after the second rest day tells the story too :
1) UAE Team Emirates-XRG € 100.670
2) Visma | Lease a Bike € 74.340
3) Alpecin – Deceuninck € 51.340
4) Lidl-Trek € 48.670
5) Soudal Quick-Step € 42.210
6) Uno-X Mobility € 30.120
7) Bahrain – Victorious € 28.790
8) EF Education – EasyPost € 27.560
9) Ineos Grenadiers € 24.330
10) Red Bull – BORA – hansgrohe € 20.820
11) Tudor Pro Cycling € 18.620
12) Team Picnic – PostNL € 16.690
13) Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale € 15.780
14) Arkéa – B&B Hotels € 15.150
15) Team Jayco AlUla € 12.720
16) Groupama – FDJ € 12.430
17) TotalEnergies € 11.640
18) Intermarché – Wanty € 11.460
19) XDS Astana € 8.770
20) Lotto € 7.730
21) Movistar € 7.230
22) Cofidis € 6.970
23) Israel – Premier Tech € 6.860
The eight stage winning teams are in the top 9 places in the tally and it’s only Bahrain-Victorious who slipped in there in 7th, mainly due to Lenny Martinez’s attacking raids picking up KOM points and wearing the polka dot jersey for a number of stages that has increased their coffers.
UAE are of course dominating the leaderboard with more than €100,000 euro but at the opposite end it’s a very tight battle for the ‘lanterne rouge’ between Cofidis on just €6970 & Israel with €6860.
Lanterne Rouge On The Podium !
Speaking of last place (lanterne rouge), that spot in the GC is currently held by RedBull’s, Jordi Meeus who is 164th and last ranked @ 4h17m43s behind Pogacar. He would have been 4h17m49s behind Pogi but placed 2nd in the stage yesterday and won himself 6 bonus seconds…
Meeus’ efforts yesterday were the first stage podium for a lanterne rouge since 1997! It was 28 years ago, when the late Philippe Gaumont (Cofidis) and Lanterne Rouge of the ’97 Tour, finished 3rd in the 63km Disneyland Paris time trial (stage 20) behind the winner Abraham Olano (Banesto) & 2nd placed, Jan Ullrich (Telekom).
The Lanterne Rouge of the 1997 Tour de France, Philippe Gaumont
GC Gaps At Le Tour
So Meeus is over 4 hours behind but incredibly almost all the riders in the peloton are more than an hour down on Tadej Pogacar ! It’s just the top 20 who make it inside the hour mark as 21st placed, Valentin Madouas (Groupama-FDJ) is now over one hour and three minutes behind.
Current GC After 17 Stages:
1 Pogačar Tadej UAE Team Emirates – XRG 61:50:16
2 Vingegaard Jonas Team Visma | Lease a Bike @ 4:15
3 Lipowitz Florian Red Bull – BORA – hansgrohe @ 9:03
4 Onley Oscar Team Picnic PostNL @ 11:04
5 Roglič Primož Red Bull – BORA – hansgrohe @ 11:42
6 Vauquelin Kévin Arkéa – B&B Hotels @ 13:20
7 Gall Felix Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team @ 14:50
8 Johannessen Tobias Halland Uno-X Mobility @ 17:01
9 Healy Ben EF Education – EasyPost @ 17:52
10 Rodríguez Carlos INEOS Grenadiers @ 20:45
11 Jegat Jordan Team TotalEnergies @ 23:10
12 O’Connor Ben Team Jayco AlUla @ 31:08
13 Martin Guillaume Groupama – FDJ @ 35:14
14 Arensman Thymen INEOS Grenadiers @ 44:20
15 Kuss Sepp Team Visma | Lease a Bike @ 47:59
16 Narváez Jhonatan UAE Team Emirates – XRG @ 52:04
17 Rodríguez Cristián Arkéa – B&B Hotels @ 53:24
18 Mas Enric Movistar Team @ 53:44
19 Higuita Sergio XDS Astana Team @ 54:57
20 Jorgenson Matteo Team Visma | Lease a Bike @ 57:35
This GC could all change today of course with the biggest mountain stage of the Tour as the riders tackle three high altitude HC climbs and there’s bad weather predicted.
Today’s Stage 18 profile – brutal
Tour Statistics Time!
It’s time for some more interesting Tour statistics now and let’s kick things off with a victory for the French :
France Wins Again : Valentin Paret-Peintre was the first Frenchman to win in this Tour after taking the mythical Ventoux stage on Tuesday. He ended a 27 stage and 380 day drought for France since Anthony Turgis won the 9th stage of the Tour 2024 in Troyes. Paret-Peintre’s Ventoux win was just his 3rd professional victory and just like his other wins it was again an uphill finish after his previous mountain top triumphs at Bocca della Selva (Giro 2024) and Jabal Al Akhdhar (Tour of Oman 2025).
Winning at the Giro in ’24
Valentin Paret-Peintre was the 5th French victory on Mont Ventoux, 60 years after Raymond Poulidor’s first in 1965 (stage 14). Then came Bernard Thévenet (1972, stage 14), Jean-François Bernard (1987, stage 18, time trial), and Richard Virenque (2002, stage 14).
Italy is back !: In a recent EuroTrash I talked about Italy’s dry run at the Tour – well yesterday’s stage shined on the Italians with Jonathan Milan in 1st, Davide Ballerini (5th), and Alberto Dainese (6th). It was the first time that Italy had placed 3 riders in the top-6 since the 17th stage of the Tour 2014, which finished in Saint-Lary-Soulan (Giovanni Visconti 2nd, Vincenzo Nibali 3rd, Alessandro De Marchi 5th).
France Leading The Combativity Race : They may only have one stage victory so far in this race but the French are definitely winning the race for the combativity prize.
In the breakaway yesterday for 147 kilometers, Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ) was awarded the prize ahead of Jonas Abrahamsen (UNO-X). Home team bias ? This is the 9th time a French rider has been awarded the prize this year (Mattéo Vercher x2, Bruno Armirail x2, Lenny Martinez x2, Ewen Costiou, Mathieu Burgaudeau, Quentin Pacher). France has not been so honored since the Tour 2008 (10 combativity prizes).
Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ) took the combativity prize yesterday…
Soudal-QuickStep Extensions
Soudal-Quicktep’s Warre Vangheluwe might not be on Le Tour but he celebrated his 24th birthday yesterday in fine style announcing a contract extension with his team.
Warre is the latest rider to extend his stay with Soudal Quick-Step, which will now stretch until the end of the 2027 season. Warre became pro with the World Tour squad last year, after a strong spell in the Soudal Quick-Step Devo Team jersey, and has scored two victories and put in countless solid displays since.
His second season in the pro ranks started out with several more strong outings, but a crash in the closing kilometers of Scheldeprijs brought an end to his Spring Classics campaign, as Warre suffered a fracture of the C1 cervical vertebra, which required him to take a period of complete rest and wear a neck brace for six weeks. Since then, he has resumed training and is currently at camp in Val di Fassa, where our team has gathered for an altitude training.
“It’s nice to extend my contract, because it shows the trust that the team has in me. It feels good to know that and I see this as a sign of appreciation for the work I try to do well. I have always dreamed of becoming a pro rider and now I am where I want to be. My hope is that I will continue to grow and help the squad’s leaders as best as possible. If I’ll get a chance to win a race myself, then I’ll do everything I can to seize it, just like last year. That’s my main ambition: to get a victory every year and always help the team when they need me”, the 24-year-old Belgian said after signing the new agreement.
“Warre is more than just a fantastic team player, he is a rider capable of taking important victories, as he has shown, as well as working hard for his teammates. He has a lot of potential, and we are confident that we are giving him the perfect environment to further develop and show what he is capable of. We will be delighted to see him back to racing soon”, explained Soudal Quick-Step CEO Jurgen Foré.
Warre wasn’t the only Soudal-Quicktep rider with an extended deal though, their road captain Yves Lampaert has also extended until the end of 2027. The man who made every cycling fan emotional in the summer of 2022, when saying in front of the cameras ‘I’m just a farmer’s son’ after his stunning Tour de France prologue victory in Copenhagen, is one of the longest-serving riders on the Belgian roster. By signing a new contract, he will now make it 13 consecutive seasons in the Soudal Quick-Step jersey.
Emotional times at the ’22 Tour
Lampaert joined the squad in 2015 and has since won a total of 16 races. Apart from his memorable success in Le Tour, other results that stand out are his back-to-back victories in Dwars door Vlaanderen – a race close to his home and his heart – the national titles he conquered on the road and in the time trial, and his stage victory at the 2017 Vuelta a España.
Lampaert winning back in 2020
One of the most experienced riders in the World Tour and a true road captain, Yves is delighted to remain a member of Soudal Quick-Step in the next two seasons: “I’m really happy that I can stay to continue racking up a lot of victories together with the team. I am also keen on sharing my experience with the young riders, just as I got to learn the trade from the more experienced riders when I was their age. I am looking forward to what will be two beautiful years, with lots of fun, great moments and wins.”
“Lampie is one of the pillars of this team, so it goes without saying how happy we are that he’ll continue with us in the next two seasons, not only to get strong results with the team, but also to guide the young riders on our squad. He has a wealth of experience and is the right person to be our road captain as we will stand our ground as one of the top teams in the world”, added Soudal Quick-Step CEO Jurgen Foré.
WALES TO HOST FINAL TWO STAGES OF THE LLOYDS TOUR OF BRITAIN MEN IN SEPTEMBER 2025
Wales will host the final two days of Britain’s biggest professional cycle race and the UK’s largest free-to-spectate live sporting event this September, as the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men builds to a spectacular finale across the south Wales climbs.
Saturday 6 and Sunday 7 September will see the world’s top cyclists racing two arduous stages across south Wales, taking in Pontypool, Newport, and Cardiff, plus the famous climb of The Tumble, near Abergavenny, in what is anticipated to be the final race of INEOS Grenadiers rider Geraint Thomas’ illustrious career.
A hometown send off for Geraint Tomas in Wales in September
Pontypool, in Torfaen, will host the start of stage five on Saturday 6 September, as the British national tour visits for the first time, with a route through Monmouthshire, that will culminate in a double ascent of The Tumble, which averages 8.2% across its five kilometres.
The final stage, on Sunday 7 September will start from the Geraint Thomas National Velodrome of Wales in the city of Newport, home to Beicio Cymru. After crossing the climbs and valleys of south Wales, the leg will pass the Maindy Velodrome, home to the Maindy Flyers Cycling Club that produced Geraint Thomas, among other Welsh stars, ahead of the finish in Cardiff city centre.
The news follows Wales hosting the Lloyds National Road Championships in Aberaeron and Aberystwyth in late June, as part of a three-year agreement between the Welsh Government and British Cycling, that saw Sam Watson (INEOS Grenadiers) and Mille Couzens (Fenix-Deceuninck) crowned road race champions.
Welsh Government Minister with responsibility for Sport, Jack Sargeant, said; “We’re excited to welcome the Men’s Tour of Britain back to Wales once again, an event we have proudly supported over a number of years. The Tour has found a successful home in Wales, and each time it returns it showcases our cities, towns, communities and landscapes to an international audience, as well as attracting athletes from all over the world.
“As we continue our preparations for welcoming a stage of the Tour de France in 2027, these final two Tour of Britain stages represent another exciting chapter in Wales’ story as an internationally-recognised destination for the very best cycling events. Wales truly is a nation made for bikes, and we’re delighted to demonstrate that on the world stage.”
September will mark the second time that Cardiff has hosted the overall finish of the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men, having done so in 2017, and only the third time in the modern race’s 21-year history that the event has finished in Wales.
The Tour of Britain racing through Wales in ’21
Newport has twice before hosted the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men, most recently in 2018, when André Greipel won the opening stage, while The Tumble has once before been a finish, 11 years ago (2014) when Edoardo Zardini took a memorable solo victory at the summit.
As part of the weekend of racing in Wales, amateur cyclists will also be able to contest the official Lloyds Tour of Britain Ride the Route on Saturday 6 September. Starting and finishing from the Geraint Thomas National Velodrome of Wales in Newport, participants will have the opportunity to ride parts of the routes of the final stage a day ahead of the professionals, with more details of the event to be announced in the coming weeks.
Further information on the Lloyds Tour of Britain Ride the Route can be found here.
Commenting on the announcement, Jonathan Day, Managing Director of British Cycling Events, said; “Wales has provided some of the most iconic moments in Lloyds Tour of Britain history over the years, and this September will be no different thanks to the two incredible stages that we have worked with our partners the Welsh Government and stakeholders to secure.
“The Lloyds Tour of Britain Men never fails to draw a crowd in south Wales, and with the four fantastic locations and two stages falling across a weekend we are confident that this will make for a really special atmosphere and a fantastic way to round out the race, and crown our 2025 champion.”
Torfaen Council Leader, Cllr Anthony Hunt said; “It’s exciting to have a stage of the Tour of Britain starting here in Pontypool and travelling through Torfaen and Monmouthshire. What a great opportunity to show off beautiful Pontypool Park and Blaenavon too.
“It will also give local people a great chance to come and see the race and pay tribute to Welsh legend, Tour de France winner and Olympic champion Geraint Thomas in his last professional race.”
Monmouthshire County Council’s Leader, Cllr Mary Ann Brocklesby, said: “We are thrilled to welcome the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men to Monmouthshire this September. Monmouthshire is ready to provide a warm welcome to all participants and spectators, and we are excited to be part of this wonderful British event. As a council, we wish all riders the best of luck as they travel through our beautiful county and take on the challenge of climbing the iconic Tumble, near Abergavenny, twice.”
Newport City Council leader, Councillor Dimitri Batrouni, said: “We’re delighted to welcome the Tour to Newport once again, and to play host to the start of this year’s final stage.
“With the Tour marking Geraint Thomas’s last professional race before his retirement, I can think of no better place to start the final stage than Wales’s national velodrome which bears his name.
“The riders, teams and spectators can all expect a warm welcome to our city, and a great atmosphere as they set off on the last leg of this year’s race.”
Cardiff Council Cabinet Member for Culture, Parks and Events, Cllr Jennifer Burke, said: “We can’t wait to welcome the Lloyds Tour of Britain back to Cardiff.
“The city is always buzzing when a major sporting event is in town and with this being homegrown sporting legend Geraint Thomas’ final race – after a career that has seen him reach the very heights of world cycling, winning world championships, Olympic golds as well as claiming the famous yellow jersey – I’m sure the streets of his hometown will be lined with spectators cheering him, and all the other participants, on through those tough final miles.”
Caroline Spanton, CEO of Beicio Cymru, said: “It’s incredibly special to see Wales hosting the final two stages of the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men – a real showcase of world-class cycling set against the spectacular backdrop of our climbs, communities and cycling culture. This is more than a race finish; it’s a powerful celebration of Wales as a nation made for bikes.
“To see the peloton pass places like Maindy Velodrome and The Tumble, and to welcome the race into Cardiff, is especially poignant in what is expected to be Geraint Thomas’ final professional road race – a fitting tribute to one of Wales’ most iconic athletes.
“Our heartfelt thanks go to the Welsh Government and local authorities whose support and investment have made these stages possible. Their commitment is helping to inspire the next generation and reaffirm Wales’ place on the international cycling stage.”
The exact routes of both Welsh stages of the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men will be published later in July.
The Lloyds Tour of Britain Men begins in East Suffolk on Tuesday 2 September, with an opening leg between Woodbridge and Southwold, followed by a second stage in Suffolk at Stowmarket, and legs taking in Milton Keynes and Central Bedfordshire, and Warwickshire before the race arrives in Wales.
Further announcements about the participating teams for the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men and the detail of all six stage routes will be made over the coming weeks.
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