Greig Leach

Despite attack after attack going in the opening kilometers of the penultimate stage of the Tour de France Femmes, no one was being allowed to escape the peloton. It felt like every time we saw the front of the group it was another Lidl-Trek woman attempting to launch off the front. This time it is Lizzie Deignan going for another try with Anna Henderson (Jumbo-Visma) and the rest of the peloton covering her move. At this point it had been eleven kilometers of attacks, catches, and counter attacks, over and over, and still no one was off the front. With two big climbs awaiting the roughly 140 still in the Tour de France Femmes, I thought they would have been happy to let a small group go so they could approach the back half of a hard, hard stage a bit more easily.