Key events
Today, Nikola Noskova (Cofidis Women Team), Yanina Kuskova (Tashkent City Women Professional Cycling Team) and Mieke Docx (Lotto Dstny Ladies) have been involved in a crash, while Dilyxine Miermont (St Michel – Mavic – Auber93 WE) and Grace Brown (FDJ-Suez) also had a collision, although the latter pair made it back into the peloton.
There have been more crashes today after the drama of yesterday. A crash in the neutral zone on stage one led to the British rider Natalie Grinczer falling and then abandoning. The Tashkent City Women’s team had a torrid first day and lost four of their seven riders.
Here is the stage one report from Monday.
There are some big names missing here: Lotte Kopecky, who raced in the final day of competition on Sunday in the Olympic velodrome and was second overall to her SD Worx Protime teammate Demi Vollering in last year’s Tour de France Femmes, was one of those who prioritised the Olympics. Elisa Longo Borghini, winner of the women’s Giro d’Italia, has also pulled out because of the painful aftermath of a recent crash while out training.
Vollering remains the overall favourite again this year.
Preamble
It’s a wild two parter today at the Tour de France Femmes: first up is the stage two run from Dordrecht to Rotterdam, a 69.7km race along the flat, with a sprint finish. There is around 18km left of that, so we’ll dive straight into that now.
Audrey De Keersmaeker is out in front on her own, and has around a 28 second lead on the rest of the peloton. Not sure she is going to hold onto that, but she will surely get the combative rider of the day award.
The stage-three time trial will also take place later: a 6.3km ride around Rotterdam. But we’ll come to that later.
