Tour de France Femmes 2026: Vollering wins the hardest edition yet

The hardest women's Tour yet

The fifth edition of the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift started on 1 August with a Grand Départ in Lausanne and finished in Nice on 9 August: 1,174.7 kilometres across nine stages. The route was billed as the hardest in the race's young history, featuring the bald giant of Provence for the first time: Mont Ventoux.

Lorena Wiebes set the tone with two sprint wins in the opening days, before Marlen Reusser won the time trial to Dijon and took yellow. In the Beaujolais, Demi Vollering struck for the first time, kicking off the three-way battle that would dominate the rest of the week.

Niewiadoma's Ventoux masterstroke

Stage 7 to the summit of Mont Ventoux instantly became a classic: Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney soloed to the stage win and the yellow jersey, turning a 1'05" deficit into a 15-second lead over Vollering. A day later Vollering hit back in Nice, taking an eight-second lead into the final stage — the smallest ever gap heading into the last day.

Decided on the Col d'Èze

On the final stage around Nice everything clicked for Vollering: she soloed clear on the Col d'Èze for her third stage win of the week and her second overall title after 2023. Reusser, still sitting third, crashed on a descent and dropped to fourteenth. Niewiadoma-Phinney finished second at 1'18", with Elisa Longo Borghini third at 4'29".

Combined with her earlier overall win at the 2026 Giro d'Italia Women, Vollering also completed a rare double: two Grand Tours won in a single season. Vuelta winner Paula Blasi confirmed her breakthrough with fifth place overall.