The 2024 Tour de France Femmes route has been announced and is set to be the toughest and most exciting parcours for the race to date.
The 2024 Tour de France Femmes route is fairly balanced, with no clear type of rider in the General Classification stakes particularly favored, and it will take a true all-rounder to prevail.
The third edition of the Tour de France Femmes is unlike anything we’ve seen in the previous two. With many new and unique features to the 2024 route, it is certain to have cycling fans on the edge of their seats throughout
In this article, we’ll cover all there is to know about the 2024 women’s Tour de France route, covering:
- 2024 Tour de France Femmes Route Overview
- Rider Reactions to the 2024 Route
- 2024 Tour de France Femmes Route: Stage-by-Stage
Let’s dive in!
Overview Of The 2024 Tour de France Femmes Route
The third edition of the Tour de France Femmes is set to take place from Monday, August 12, 2024, to Sunday, August 18, 2024.
Although the race has historically been held in July following the men’s Tour de France, it has been pushed back to August as a result of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris being held from July 26 until August 11.
The route will cover 946.3 km (588 miles) over eight stages across three countries, including 10,700 meters (35,105 feet) of elevation gain throughout.
This year, the women’s Tour de France will also feature its first foreign Grand Départ. Stages 1 through 4 will take place in the Netherlands and Belgium, before heading into France for the final four stages.
The women will have to negotiate four mountain ranges, including the Ardennes, Vosges, Jura, and the French Alps.
Featuring three flat stages, one time trial, two hilly stages, and two mountain stages, the 2024 Tour de France Femmes route is likely to favor a true all-rounder.
Rider Reactions to the 2024 Route
2023 Tour de France Femmes winner Demi Vollering will be keen to defend her yellow jersey in 2024.
Like us, she’s also thrilled by the prospect of an iconic summit finish on the race’s final stage. “As a little girl, I dreamt about riding up Alpe d’Huez,” she wrote on an SD Worx social media post. “Now, I can finally race up the famous mountain.”
Current World Champion Lotte Kopecky also expressed excitement about the route, especially the fact that it runs through her native Belgium in the early stages.
“When I see the course, I definitely want to ride [it]. The fact that it goes through Belgium is also a very nice thing.”
However, the 2024 Tour’s proximity to the Olympics is leading Lopecky to question her involvement. Despite her excitement about the route, she said, “the Tour is every year, while the Olympic Games [takes place] only once every four years.”
2024 Tour De France Femmes Route: Stage-By-Stage
Stage 1: Rotterdam → La Haye (124 km)
Stage 1 will take riders from Rotterdam to La Haye in a flat day that will likely favor a final mass sprint.
Although the roads in the southwest of the Netherlands are flat, the riders will be faced with a technical race. Dutch races are notorious for their twisting, narrow roads and treacherous winds, often forcing echelons to form.
With a slew of talented Dutch sprinters in the Women’s WorldTour (WWT), such as Lorena Wiebes (SD Worx) and Charlotte Kool (dsm-firmenich), they will certainly be looking to write their names in Tour history on home soil.
Stage 2: Dordrecht → Rotterdam (67 km)
Day two will see the women race both Stage 2 and Stage 3 on the same day.
Stage 2 will see riders take on a 67 km road race from Dordrecht to Rotterdam.
With such a short road race, it will surely be intense and exciting. Thanks to the flat Dutch roads, it is once again likely to favor a mass sprint finish.
Stage 3: Rotterdam → Rotterdam (6.3 km)
The only individual time trial (ITT) of the 2024 Tour de France Femmes route will take place on the same day as the short road race of Stage 2.
Although Rotterdam, the port city of the Netherlands, is flat, riders will have to face some elevation when crossing the city’s iconic bridges, the Erasmusbrug and the Willemsbrug.
This won’t be the first time the city of Rotterdam gets a short visit from Tour riders. Rotterdam hosted the 2010 Tour de France prologue, which also crossed the city’s iconic bridges.
Dutch time-trial specialist Marlen Reusser (SD Worx) will certainly have her eyes on this stage despite it being shorter than typical time-trial routes.
Stage 4: Valkenburg → Liège (122 km)
Stage 4 of the TdFF is where the contest for the General Classification (GC) really begins.
The first hilly stage will see riders take on eight climbs as they ride from Valkenburg in the Netherlands across the border to Liège in Belgium.
A stage perfectly suited to puncheurs will challenge riders with some iconic climbs, including the Cauberg (0.7 km at 8%), Côte de la Redoute (1.6 km at 9.4%), Côte des Forges (1.3 km at 7.8%), and Côte de la Roche aux Faucons (1.3 km at 11%).
Stage 5: Bastogne → Amnéville (150 km)
Stage 5 is the first day the Tour will see France, and it is sure to be an exciting race.
Considered a “flat” stage, the race nonetheless packs over 2,000 meters of elevation into its 150 km length. The elevation, however, comes from a series of short, punchy climbs, which many sprinters may able to survive.
It would not be a shock to see this stage come down to a reduced sprint, with many GC contenders in the mix.
Lorena Wiebes (SD Worx), the most dominant sprinter in the Women’s WorldTour, showed an improvement in her climbing abilities at this year’s Tour of Scandinavia.
It would not be a surprise to see Wiebes, along with teammate and former Tour de France Femmes winner Demi Vollering and current World Champion Lotte Kopecky, in the mix during the finale.
Stage 6: Remiremont → Morteau (160 km)
Stage 6 is the second–longest stage and the final hilly stage of the Tour route. The 160 km from Remiremont to Morteau will challenge riders with five marked climbs.
Two of these climbs, La Roche du Prêtre (5.5 km at 5.6%) and Côte des Fins (1.8 km at 6.9%), come within the final 30 km of the stage.
This will certainly challenge the GC contenders, and we’ll likely to see a select group disappear up the road.
Stage 7: Champagnole → Let Grand-Bornand (167 km)
Stage 7 is the first of two back-to-back mountain stages and is certain to shake things up in the GC. It is also the longest stage of the 2024 Tour de France Femmes route at 167 km.
The five climbs in the stage are not the only challenge riders will face, as they bring accumulated fatigue from the previous six stages into their first test in the mountains.
Riders will negotiate the longest climb of the stage, Col de la Croix de la Serra (12 km at 5.1%), early on, after about 45 km of racing.
The peloton will then face two back-to-back climbs for an uphill finish to the stage.
The Col de Saint-Jean-de-Sixt (5.4 km at 5.1%) and Montée du Chinaillon (7 km at 5.1%) are only separated by a short few kilometers of downhill relief.
Stage 8: Le Grand-Bornand → Alpe d’Huez (150 km)
The final stage of the TdFF will also be contested in the mountains, with a summit finish along the iconic Alpe d’Huez (13.8 km at 8.1%).
This will be the first time in 31 years that women will race up the famous climb. The last time Alpe d’Huez featured in women’s racing was the 1992 and 1993 Tour Cycliste Féminin.
If the 2024 edition of the Tour de France Femmes is anything like last year’s nail-biter, where Demi Vollering took the win on Col du Tourmalet, we’re certainly in for a thrilling final stage.
It will be a true test of endurance as riders must take on two other climbs, Col de Tamié (9.5 km at 4%) and Col du Glandon (19.7 km at 7.2%), before the iconic finishing climb.
We Want To Hear From You!
Which stage are you most excited to watch? Who do you think will prevail on the iconic mountain finale on Alpe d’Huez? Is there anything you are specifically looking forward to or would change about the route?
Let us know in the comments below!
