MORTEAU, France — Cedrine Kerbaol took the first-ever stage win by a French rider in the modern Tour de France Femmes, with a daring attack 15km from the finish in Morteau, to move up to second in the overall standings, with two mountain stages of the race remaining.
“First French winner on the Tour de France Femmes, that’s something super-cool,” Kerbaol said after victory on stage six.
Kerbaol lifted her arms above her head and made a heart sign with her hands as she crossed the line at the end of the sixth stage, a hilly 159.2-kilometre (99-mile) route from Remiremont to Morteau.
“I hope it gives a lot of motivation to the next generation. That’s what I’m thinking about.” Her Ceratizit-WNT team’s social-media feed was more succinct. “Holy shit!” it exclaimed on X.
The path to her success was laid by an initial attack from the local rider Juliette Labous, who was racing on the roads of her youth.
But if Labous was too tightly marked by the favourites to break away, Kerbaol was not and she moved clear over the top of the final climb, the Côte des Fins.
On the winding descent to Morteau, the 23-year-old Breton dropped her final companion, threw caution to the wind and extended her lead, racing along the banks of the river Doubs, before climbing alone, to the finish on the Avenue Charles de Gaulle.
Behind her, the defending champion, Demi Vollering, injured after crashing close to the finish of stage five in Amneville, recovered from her setback to finish in the chasing group, with race leader, Kasia Niewiadoma.
Speaking after the finish, Polish cyclist Niewiadoma seemed unconcerned that Vollering had not been fully tested, just 24 hours after her high-speed crash.
“The whole peloton is focusing on the last two stages, because they’re the most crucial ones and the hardest ones,” Niewiadoma said.
“The race was more like a breakaway day. But definitely getting into the final, with all the climbs, I felt there was a little testing between us. But none of us were committed to put the hammer down.”
Kerbaol’s initiative, on the fastest section of a steep descent, appeared to take her rivals by surprise and, in fact, had been premeditated.
“I’d planned to attack at some point, but not particularly there,” the French rider said.
“I knew there was a downhill. I took a lot of pleasure in the descent, because I really like that. It was a bit harder on the flat part [to the finish].”
Only 79 seconds now separate the top 10 riders, as the Tour heads into decisive days in the Jura and Haute-Savoie. With 10 teams also represented, there are multiple tactical permutations.
While Vollering’s lack of support over the past 48 hours was seen by some as indicative of rifts within the SD Worx team, Niewiadoma has also faced a backlash of sorts, for racing on in Amneville, as Vollering lay injured on the road.
“I definitely saw some comments,” she said. “I know there are always split opinions. I have never seen a bike race where the peloton would wait for someone in the last six kilometres, especially when half the bunch was unaware what had happened.”
