Demi Vollering is all about the process. During her race winner’s press conference in Nice on Sunday evening, the Dutch superstar appeared keener to talk about the build-up to this year’s Tour de France Femmes than she did the fact she’s just become the first rider to win the modern iteration of the race twice.
Not only that, but Vollering also pulled off her second Tour triumph in swashbuckling style, following up her blistering – if somewhat controversial – late attack on Saturday, with a storming ride on the Col d’Èze, blowing away closest rival Kasia Niewiadoma to secure a brilliant, yellow jersey-sealing solo victory.
At the start of the final day of what was a finely balanced, enthralling, back-and-forth race, Vollering led Niewiadoma by just eight seconds, after overturning the Pole’s 15-second advantage garnered on Mont Ventoux on Friday. By the end of four, all-action laps around Nice on Sunday, Vollering’s Tour-winning margin was 1.18.
Halfway through this year’s Tour, when the unfortunate Marlen Reusser was still in yellow, Niewiadoma predicted that the race could be turned “upside down” in Nice. She wasn’t wrong.
After crossing the line on the Promenade des Anglais, hand covering her mouth, Vollering stopped in front of the gaggle of photographers, dismounted, and raised her bike in the air.
Three years on from her first Tour Femmes win – which, at the time, felt like the beginning of a long, dominant dynasty – that moment seemed cathartic for Vollering, the first woman to pull off the double in the modern event’s five-year history.
Asked by road.cc during her press conference for her thoughts on making Tour Femmes history, and why doing the double has proved so difficult for the modern peloton, the FDJ United-Suez leader said: “It’s really special to win it twice. It’s something I’ve dreamed of but also worked very hard for. We really enjoyed the process coming into this Tour, working very hard together as a team. We really prepared for this to be in our best shape.
“We really enjoyed the process, which made this Tour really enjoyable. Even with what happened, we really enjoyed the process before. It’s something you need to stand by, as it’s not only the dream of winning the yellow jersey, it’s the whole journey leading to this moment. That’s the most beautiful story there is, and we need to enjoy our lives.
“We’re at training camps, working so hard every day to become better and better. And it’s beautiful to do that and have a passion for our sport. So it’s nice to win the yellow jersey, but it’s also important to enjoy the process.”
She continued: “The first one is always the most special, it’s a big dream. I’ve changed because I’ve realised it’s not my only goal in life. Getting ready for the Tour with your teammates is a really cool thing. It’s all of it together that makes this moment so beautiful.
“That you enjoy coming into the Tour in really good form and you have people around you who believe in the dream and work very hard for it, and sacrifice their own goals for the team goal. That’s a special thing.”
That process, however enjoyable it is, meant that Vollering pulled off the double at arguably the toughest, fastest Tour Femmes ever. Case in point: her closest rival Niewiadoma’s brilliant solo victory on Mont Ventoux – which was estimated to have required a power output between 5.3 and 5.6w/kg – may be the single greatest ride in women’s cycling history. In Nice, Vollering simply blew her away. Twice.
If women’s cycling is in the midst of a golden generation, with a deeper, better array of talent than ever before, Vollering is indisputably that generation’s leader. She’s probably at her peak, too.
This year alone, the 29-year-old has won 15 races, ranging from cobbled classics to grand tours, including Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, the Tour of Flanders, Flèche Wallonne, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, and the Giro d’Italia.
Speaking to TNT Sports after the final stage, Niewiadoma admitted that Vollering was driving her and the peloton to new heights.
“I mean, honestly, having a competitor like Demi just motivates me to be stronger,” she said. “I know the Tour is finished, but I feel like I just want to message my coach and say, ‘OK, this and this and this we need to change, or work on’.”
“Demi makes me want to work harder and get the yellow jersey again,” the Canyon-SRAM rider added in her press conference.
“I think it’s nice that your rivals say this about, and it shows their strength,” Vollering said when her rivals’ comments were brought up on Sunday evening. “I’m a strong believer that your rivals bring you to a higher level, we keep each other motivated and focused.
“We have to force ourselves to be a better version every day, because the others are growing too. It’s a never-ending process and you need to keep working hard.”
Appearing to reference the ‘weight debate’ which permeated women’s cycling in the wake of Pauline Ferrand-Prévot’s Tour win last year, Vollering continued: “And you need to see it long term, to not do crazy stuff. It’s only your cycling career and after you have your life. You want to stay healthy and I don’t want to sacrifice everything for this dream.
“Of course I will give everything, but I don’t want to force myself into corners where I don’t belong. Some girls think getting skinnier is the way to get to a higher level, but I don’t believe in that. First of all, I believe you need to be a healthy version of yourself.
“You train very hard every day, you focus on your recovery, and that’s how you get better. Not taking shortcuts for short-term gain. You always need to see life in the bigger picture.”
Meanwhile, third-placed Elisa Longo Borghini argued that it’s not just the big Tour contenders who are improving, it’s the entire peloton – though the Italian champion acknowledged that more investment is needed at lower levels to ensure that the current ‘golden generation’ can be replaced.
“The level of women’s cycling in general is very high at the moment. At the [men’s] Tour de France, it is always funny because they are coming out with all these numbers, about watts per kilos and time of climbing, but in every Tour, let’s say grand tour, if we can call them this, we are breaking records,” Longo Borghini said.
“Also, at the Giro last year, 5.3[w/kg] has been done, but no-one talked about it because it was not the Tour. And I’m very happy that here at least we are speaking about women being fast on the bike.
“We’re reaching a great level in cycling in general. But I would like to see the base widened a little bit, and to not see small team disappear. Because, otherwise we will not see a change of generation and young girls will not have the chance to have experience.
“I did a third junior year because I was not good. I never did European or world championships as a junior and now I’m standing on the podium of the Tour de France. Maybe out there, there’s a strong girl who didn’t get the chance to go to a devo team. I would like to see more races for young, U23 girls in the future.”
Vollering, however – rather understandably – is more focused on herself and her own improvement, which has finally led to her adding another yellow jersey to her collection.
“I’ve just grown as a human being, I’ve become more adult and more calm, more relaxed,” she said, when asked about how she’s changed since that first win in 2023. “I know now that if you lose the Tour, life is not over. There are people who still love you the same way, so you just try again, which helps by lowering the pressure.
“I feel like I’m growing as a person, you learn over the years so much. You keep learning and you put it all in your backpack. Sometimes you think you’re struggling because you think you have it all figured out. The moment you think you’ve figured it out, that’s when you lose the feeling and think why it doesn’t work anymore.
“But that’s life, you need to keep evolving and work on every detail. You should never think you’re there, because you’re never going to get there. Life is a whole process, it has its ups and downs, and you need to try to do everything as good as possible.
“There’s no end goal until we’re not here in this world anymore! But you need to enjoy every step of the way and become a better version of yourself every day.”
In other words, trust the process. It can lead to yellow.
