Juliette Labous climbs to 4th overall on GC at Tour, after day of misfortune for Team dsm-firmenich PostNL

The penultimate day of racing at the Tour de France Femmes saw the peloton head to the mountains and a summit finish atop Le Grand-Bornand. It was a hard and fast start to the stage and unfortunately bad luck plighted Team dsm-firmenich PostNL from the start of the day with Charlotte Kool abandoning due to fatigue before shortly after Becky Storrie had to climb off due to a crash.

In the peloton the rest of the team rallied around Juliette Labous as best as possible, keeping her safe and cool on this warm day. The stage would ultimately be won by the breakaway with Ghekiere holding on to take a solo victory, while the GC group battled it out for the minor podium places and top ten. After having a difficult moment, Labous dug deep and returned to the ever-reducing yellow jersey group, fighting to the line where she took eighth place on the stage, and with that moving into fourth place on GC ahead of tomorrow’s final stage.

An update on Kool and Storrie will follow later this evening.

Speaking after the stage Labous said: “I didn’t feel so good in the heat today, but the girls did really well and the best they could to help me. I had a tough moment on the final climb but managed to make it back and in the end I’m happy to have only lost five seconds to Kasia and Demi. Hopefully today was my one bad day of the race and I’m looking forward to giving it my all tomorrow in a stage that should suit me better.”

Team dsm-firmenich PostNL coach Kelvin Dekker: “I think for now we can happy because Juliette didn’t have her best day on the climb so to lose only five seconds to Vollering and Niewiadoma and then gaining some time on Kerbaol and being in the mix with the others; it’s a good result all things considered. It was a pity to lose Charlotte after the great start to the race and then Becky as well in the crash, as these were two stages which really suited her abilities as well. It’s a shame to lose them both from the race. Francesca and Franziska did an amazing job to support Juliette for as long as they possibly could. Juliette didn’t have the best day but that can also happen, and it’s better for it to happen today rather tomorrow. We’re still where we want to be in the overall picture, so we will see what happens tomorrow.”