The game of cat and mouse between the two strongest teams in women’s racing gathered pace in the Tour de France Femmes as the race leader, Lotte Kopecky, of Team SD Worx, was outsprinted in Mauriac by the German rider Liane Lippert, of Movistar.
Kopecky’s team, led by Demi Vollering, dominated the first stage in Clermont-Ferrand, but Annemiek van Vleuten’s Movistar responded with Lippert’s first Tour de France success on stage two.
In a result described by the 40-year-old Van Vleuten as a “breakthrough win”, her 25-year-old teammate held off Kopecky to take the biggest success of her career.
“I have been waiting a really long time to win a race like this,” Lippert said. “We knew that this was one of the hardest days in the race and we did a recon of this stage. It means so much for me and I hope, like Annemiek says, now I can keep on winning.”
Kopecky, led out by Vollering on the steep ramp to the finish line, had appeared perfectly positioned but in the final 100 metres was unable to fend off Lippert. It was only after the finish line that she realised she had a slow puncture.
“I took the last corner behind Demi and thought something was wrong,” Kopecky said.
“Demi started the lead‑out and I kept sprinting to the line. But it was a very strong finish from Liane Lippert. She deserved the win.”
Behind the leaders, a battered peloton was counting the cost of multiple crashes in the closing kilometres. “I’m happy we finished safe,” Vollering, who finished second to Van Vleuten in the 2022 Tour de France Femmes, said.
“We saw Eva van Agt crash and it was chaos. It was very slippery. I saw a couple of riders off the road, on the ground, in the last descent.
“It was pretty scary at that point. I was really careful. I’d rather lose a few seconds than crash. I did the sprint for Lotte, but she only noticed afterwards that she had a flat tyre. If I’d known that before, I would have done my own sprint to try and take the stage win myself.”
On the final climb, the Côte de Trebiac, first Katarzyna Niewiadoma, of Canyon-SRAM, and then Juliette Labous, of Team DSM-Firmenich, tested their rivals. The final move, from Marlen Reusser of Team SD Worx, was chased down by Elisa Longo Borghini, riding for Lidl-Trek, setting up a sprint finish.
Vollering, tracked throughout by Van Vleuten, preferred to keep her powder dry. “Maybe I would have won 10 seconds,” she said of her decision not to attack, “but I’d prefer to save my legs for Wednesday and Saturday.”
The rivalry between the two Dutch riders is intense. They are expected to shadow each other closely as the race develops, before a first showdown on Wednesday in the fourth stage from Cahors to Rodez, which includes five categorised climbs, and a pivotal battle on Saturday’s gruelling Pyrenean stage to the Col du Tourmalet.
Cooler temperatures and steady drizzle characterised much of a stage which included six categorised ascents and a 6km climb to the finish. But the climbs of the Cantal also proved as disruptive as predicted, with multiple riders distanced in the 151.7km stage.
A series of attacks were contained until the back-to-back hauls up the Côtes des Plaines and Boissieres, which split the peloton into small groups and also led to Van Vleuten crashing in a tangle of bikes, with Longo Borghini also briefly delayed.
However, it was the long drop leading to the final climb that did the most damage, with Van Agt, riding for Jumbo-Visma, crashing into roadside barriers on the fast descent. She was treated for concussion by medical staff but has abandoned the race.
