Tour de France, Paris-Roubaix & Co.: 10 special moments of the 2023 women's cycling season
Thomas Huber
· 17.12.2023
1st Vollering beats team-mate Kopecky in a photo finish at the Strade Bianche
Strade Bianche is one of the first one-day races of the season and attracted attention in two ways in 2023. Firstly, a horse briefly strayed onto the race course and caused the spectators to go wild, then there was a showdown between two SD-Worx team-mates. Lotte Kopecky and Demi Vollering caught Kirsten Faulkner, who had been in the lead up to that point, on the final climb in Siena before the two riders reached the finishing straight. They crossed the finish line in a photo finish, and for several minutes it was unclear which of the two was the winner. According to the pictures, Vollering had passed Kopecky by a hair's breadth. It was the start of a fabulous season for the Dutchwoman.
2nd Kopecky's emotional victory at Nokere Koerse
A few days after second place at Strade Bianche, Lotte Kopecky then finished first in the Nokere Koerse one-day race. However, it was a particularly emotional victory for her: four days before the race, her brother Seppe had suddenly passed away. With her victory, she not only demonstrated her riding class, but also her mental strength. With a lead of almost half a minute over second-placed Lorena Wiebes, she proved her superiority. Kopecky crossed the finish line as a soloist, with her head bowed in triumph and not cheering. She then dedicated the victory to her late brother, who got her into cycling.
3rd Alison Jackson wins Paris-Roubaix
There was a surprise victory in the "Queen of the Classics" in 2023. The 34-year-old Canadian Alison Jackson won in the final sprint and celebrated her first victory in a World Tour race. Because the group of favourites around Lotte Kopecky and Lorena Wiebes came down in a mass crash 38 kilometres before the finish in the "Hell of the North", the breakaway group saved their lead into the Roubaix velodrome. There, Alison Jackson proved to be the most lively of the bunch and came out on top in the final sprint ahead of her rivals around Katia Ragusa. At the finish line, the EF Education-Tibco-SVB rider could hardly believe her sensational victory.
4th Ardennes triple for Demi Vollering
After winning Strade Bianche, Demi Vollering underlines that she is the measure of all things in women's cycling in 2023 in the Ardennes Classics. Within a week, the Dutchwoman from Team SD Worx won the Amstel Gold Race, Fleche Wallonne and Liège-Bastogne-Liège. This makes her only the second woman to achieve this triple. In 2017, Anna van der Breggen won the three races in a row - today, the 33-year-old is the sporting director of Team SD Worx. She may have been able to pass on her winning gene from the Ardennes races to her current protégé.
5th Van Vleuten shakes her way to Vuelta victory
After her impressive victories in 2021 and 2022 at the Vuelta a Espana Femenina, Annemiek van Vleuten's last Tour of Spain was much closer. Although she pulled out a gap of over a minute on her rival Demi Vollering on the sixth stage, she lost touch with the leaders early on in the race. On the final seventh stage, however, things got tight once again. Five kilometres before the finish, van Vleuten loses touch with her compatriot Vollering, who also wins the stage in the end. At the finish, van Vleuten was 56 seconds behind the day's winner and saved the overall victory with a nine-second buffer.
6th Liane Lippert wins the 2nd stage of the Tour de France Femmes
Two German riders attracted particular attention with stage wins at the Tour de France Femmes. On stage 2, Liane Lippert from Team Movistar won out of a larger group in an uphill sprint. The 25-year-old also prevailed against Lotte Kopecky, who was riding in yellow, in rainy conditions and was able to celebrate her first Grand Tour stage win. However, the Friedrichshafen rider's victory did not come out of the blue. She had already finished second behind the dominator Demi Vollering at Fleche Wallonne. However, Lippert was not the only German to win a stage ...
7th Ricarda Bauernfeind celebrates stage win at Tour of France
Ricarda Bauernfeind won the 5th stage of the Tour de France Femmes. On undulating terrain, she broke away 35 kilometres before the finish and tried to ride solo. When the SD Worx team tried to bring the co-favourite for the stage win, Lotte Kopecky, up to the German breakaway, the peloton fell apart. Only the Swiss rider Marleen Reusser and Liane Lippert tried to catch Bauernfeind in the final kilometres. The young German defied the attempts and in the end saved a 22-second lead to the finish. The German winner of stage 2, Liane Lippert, finished third on the day, while Bauernfeind celebrated her first victory at World Tour level. In the end, the 23-year-old finished a strong ninth overall.
8th Vollering dethrones van Vleuten on the Tourmalet
For many years, Dutch cycling legend Annemiek van Vleuten was the great dominator in women's cycling. However, during the 7th stage of the Tour de France Femmes, the 40-year-old was shown her limits by her compatriot Demi Vollering. During the queen stage, the field of favourites completely disintegrated on the final climb. On the legendary Col du Tourmalet Demi Vollering fought her way impressively up the mountain as the fastest rider and outclassed her rivals. In the end, she finished almost two minutes ahead of Poland's Katarzyna Niewiadoma and outpaced Annemiek van Vleuten by over two and a half minutes. Demi Vollering thus dethroned the former dominator and became the measure of all things in women's cycling. The stage win was also the preliminary decision in the battle for the overall Tour victory.
9th Kopecky Festival at the Cycling World Championships
One rider in particular stood out at the World Cycling Championships in Glasow: Lotte Kopecky. The Belgian first secured the gold medal in the elimination time trial and the points race on the track, before also winning on the road. In a hectic race, Lotte Kopecky and Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig pulled away shortly before the finish. The Dutchwoman proved to be more lively and outsprinted her opponent, who was even caught by Demi Vollering in the final metres. In the end, Kopecky won the race by three seconds. With the Belgian's third gold medal, the World Cycling Championships were rechristened the Kopecky Festival.
10th Van Vleuten bids farewell with overall victory at the Tour of Scandinavia
Annemiek van Vleuten is one of the most successful female cyclists in history. In her last year as a professional, the Dutchwoman showed what she is made of. On her farewell tour, she not only won the Vuelta a Espana Femenina and the Giro Donne in 2023. She also won her penultimate professional race ever: at the Tour of Scandinavia, she needed two seconds less than Cecilie Uttrup Ludwig for the five stages and once again proved her winning gene. Van Vleuten thus finished in the position in which she so often finished her races - in first place.
