Tour de France Femmes stage 8 preview: get ready for the Queen Stage

The first of two mountain top finishes, where the general classification will be decided and a brutal day in the saddle for all involved.  From yesterday’s finish town, Chambéry, to the Col de la Madeleine might only be 111.9km, but the peloton takes on 3,549m of climbing which is exactly why this can be called the queen stage. 

Start: 13:30 CET
Estimated arrival: 17:30 CET
Stage distance: 111.9km
Elevation gain: 3,549m

Stage eight is a step into the unknown for this year’s Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift. Yes, there have been mountains, but none of them have been too challenging in themselves, even if some of them have been ridden incredibly hard, like the Col du Granier was yesterday. Tomorrow the Col de la Madeleine is 18.6km at 8.1%, like nothing we’ve yet seen. 

On the Granier yesterday, Fenix-Deceuninck made the pace, putting Le Court in deep trouble before their leader, Pauliena Rooijakkers, put in a huge effort in the final 3k of the climb. Though she lost 11 seconds to her rivals on the descent, she is clearly flying, climbing better than we’ve ever seen her. On one hand, she’s not a regular winner, but on the other, she’s never looked so good. She does lack a punch, though, and will need to drop her rivals as she cannot compete in a sprint, even uphill.

We’ve not seen a lot of Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime) this Tour, she’s cruised at the front a couple of times, but the only time we’ve seen her put in a big effort was on stage five, where she drove over the final climb. There she appeared to put Demi Vollering (FDJ-SUEZ) in trouble, and while the latter was still recovering from her crash two days before, we’ve not seen anyone else do that for a while. The longer climbs were Van der Breggen’s downfall at both the Vuelta and Giro, so maybe she’s not as good as she looks, but an in-form Van der Breggen is a killer on the bike

Today is a pure climber’s stage, and Sarah Gigante (AG Insurance-Soudal) is a pure climber. So she can’t quite descend with the best, but today she doesn’t need to. She proved herself among the best at the Giro, bridging to and putting time into eventual winner Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ) with relative ease. She’s currently eighth overall, within 50 seconds of all but the yellow jersey and team mate Kim Le Court. If Gigante is given an inch, she could well take yellow.

Another rider we’ve not seen a lot of is Pauline Ferrand-Prévot. Yes, she was off the front on the opening stage a week ago, and we’ve heard her in the pre and post-race interviews, but she’s mostly kept herself to herself. The glimpses we have seen, she has been in total control, apparently under no physical pressure whatsoever. Even her Visma | Lease a Bike team has kept themselves to themselves in the hilly stages; they’ve not been in the breakaways or doing much of the pace setting.

That’ll change as Ferrand-Prévot will be fighting for the stage win, and who’d bet against another French stage winner?