5 favourites for the Tour de France Femmes green jersey
As we saw in the men’s race, a prolific GC rider like Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) can often find themselves competing for the points classification, but here we’re concentrating on the sprinters who have traditionally competed for the green jersey. It’s rarely the pure sprinters, though, and this year, with a paucity of pure, flat stages, the competition perhaps suits punchier riders more than all-out fast women. And of those, two names spring out more than others.
Lorena Wiebes (SD Worx-Protime)
The undisputed queen of the sprints has been unbeatable in bunch kicks this year, winning every single time she has sprinted at the front of a race, and adding 14 victories to an already remarkable palmarès consisting of 107 wins. She’s still only 26 years old.
But it’s not just her sprint, she is becoming increasingly versatile as she ages, riding well in the hills and often leading the peloton home in hilly races, like Amstel Gold Race, where she was sixth. She is also an excellent domestique, repaying her teammates on hillier days, and often deep into the climbing days.
She recently won the points classification at the Giro d’Italia Women on what was a challenging and hilly course, getting in breakaways and hoovering up points even on mountain days. However, there her team had a poor GC race, freeing her up to chase points. At the Tour, if Lotte Kopecky and Anna van der Breggen are going well in the overall, those opportunities might not present themselves.
Marianne Vos (Visma | Lease a Bike)
It’s not been a brilliant year for Marianne Vos. She may be almost universally and deservedly known as the greatest of all time, but she’s only added two wins to her stacked palmarès this year, both in the Vuelta España Femenina, where ominously she won the points classification.
She is an absolute master of positioning and tactics, so will be in the right place at the right time, the only question is whether she still has the legs to take the points, aged 38. She has won the jersey twice before, including in 2024.
She might struggle for out-and-out horsepower against Wiebes in the sprints, but she’s such a canny operator that she will find a way to accumulate points. However, for the first time in many years, though, her team will be running a dual leadership, with Pauline Ferrand-Prevot returning from years racing mountain bike, aiming for the GC, something which may hinder Vos’s green jersey ambitions.
Letizia Paternoster (Liv-AlUla-Jayco)
Another rider who has benefited from a change of teams is Letizia Paternoster. An accomplished track rider, it’s fair to say her eyes have not been entirely on the road, but, despite winning Trek-Segafredo’s first-ever race, she seemed a little lost on the American team.
Indeed, her win in Australia for what is now Lidl-Trek was her last for them, and she has only taken one since a year after she joined Jayco-AlUla in 2023.
She may not be a regular winner, but in recent seasons she has consistently competed in sprints, especially at the end of tough, gnarly days out. Paternoster briefly led the points classification at the Vuelta Femenina, and the team have expressed an intention to be active and aggressive during the Tour, which may well include a bid for green.
Elisa Balsamo (Lidl-Trek)
Like every sprinter, Elisa Balsamo has also fallen victim to Wiebes’s dominance, though at least the Italian has been winning, adding five to her list of victories this year, including a third win at the lumpy Trofeo Alfredo Binda.
The 27-year-old former world champion might not have the raw sprinting power of her Dutch counterpart, but she is her equal, possibly better, in the climbs, so she will certainly be able to compete for the green jersey next week, even if she has yet to beat Wiebes in a straight-up sprint this year. Indeed, she has only finished ahead of her once in any race so far in 2025.
That won’t stop her trying, though, especially with the gnarly nature of this year’s sprints, where she may well have the upper hand, meaning the green jersey could well come down to those intermediate sprints.
Ally Wollaston (FDJ-SUZ)
By winning the Tour of Britain recently, New Zealander Ally Wollaston proved just what an intelligent rider she is. She night not have won a stage, but eighth was her lowest placing and she hoovered up bonus, winning some every days unit was with those that she won the GC.
There is no chance of her winning the Tour GC, but the sprints are all right up her street. Built in the mould of Lotte Kopecky, Wollaston is extremely versatile and will make it over the climbs in a position to sprint for both the stages and the intermediates. She is unlikely to beat Wiebes in a pure bunch sprint, the Tour of Britain proved that too, but she’ll regularly score points.
However, like some of the others here, team responsibilities will come first and she will find herself riding for the overall favourite, team mate Demi Vollering during the race and that may well interfere with accumulating points.
