Juliette Labous fights to the end at Tour de France Femmes to finish 9th on GC

Ambitions of a podium spot on GC sadly dropped away for Juliette Labous and Team dsm-firmenich PostNL on the queen stage and final day of the Tour de France Femmes as Labous crossed the line in 14th, eventually placing ninth overall. Labous lost contact with the select front group on the slopes of the Col du Glandon, the penultimate climb before the finishing ascent of Alpe d’Huez, but was unable to make her way back to the leading groups.

The stage got off to a promising start with Franziska Koch making the day’s early break of 22 riders, giving Labous potential support up the road if needed later on. Whilst behind, she had Rachele Barbieri and Francesca Barale to help keep her in position. The breakaway with Koch splintered on the climbs and she was eventually brought back before Labous lost the wheels on the Glandon. She fought on in the chase groups down through the valley and up the slopes to the finish, but Labous eventually finished just over eight minutes down on the stage winner, Vollering.

Despite the stage result and final GC standings, Team dsm-firmenich PostNL can look back on a successful Tour de France Femmes with two opening stage victories and the yellow and green jerseys in the team early on.

Labous said after the stage: “Today was a tough day. The start was OK and we had Franzi in the break and she was really strong. Francesca and Rachele really positioned me well for the first climb. I felt quite OK but when the pace went up I had to drop. I kept on fighting to the top and we were not so far, less than one minute, so I kept believing that we would come back but my group wasn’t working so we didn’t. We were at almost four minutes at the bottom of Alpe d’Huez and I was completely empty – my body had reached its limit and that’s how it is.

“I came for a podium so a top 10 is not what I wanted. It’s better than nothing of course and still shows that when I’m tired I can still do OK. Although, I wanted to do more for the girls and for the staff also. But we did have a really good start and the win with Charlotte was really special, I’m really happy that I was part of this. I’m super thankful for the support of the team and we also had some back luck with crashes so it wasn’t an easy week. I think I’m just really tired and need some rest now.”

Team dsm-firmenich PostNL coach Kelvin Dekker added: “We went into the stage with the aim of the podium and it started well with Franzi in the break, Rachele came back to help in positioning which was nice and Francesca did a really good job. I think we climbed really well and then a few kilometres before the top of the Glandon we saw Juliette was dropping. At that point we were hoping that by setting her own pace she might come back but over the top it quickly became clear that there was a big separation between the leaders in front and her group behind.

“They lost a lot of time on the kickers after and on the flat. Then on Alpe d’Huez we knew it was about just staying in this group and fighting for a top 10. It was a hard struggle and at the end she finished ninth on GC. It’s not the result we came for but we can look back on a really impressive tour which couldn’t be unsuccessful after the opening two days. So, we as a team can be very proud and did everything we could. We had amazing results the first two days which we’ll never forget, just the GC is a bit disappointing the last day but we can look back on an amazing tour as a team.”