Visma | Lease a Bike still empty-handed after six Tour de France Femmes stages

Visma | Lease a Bike is still coming up empty-handed after six days of the Tour de France Femmes. The Dutch team has yet to win a stage and, on top of that, saw general classification leader Pauline Ferrand-Prévot already lose minutes in the standings. This has opened the door for attackers, who will now have a little more room to maneuver, but can they still capitalize on it?

Visma | Lease a Bike emphasized before the Tour de France Femmes that everything in the 9-day stage race would revolve around Ferrand-Prévot and that stage wins were not a priority. In that regard, the team’s results aren’t all that surprising, although Vos did go for it on Day 1, we saw Lieke Nooijen finish second in the time trial on Stage 4, and Sarah Van Dam was in contention on Thursday during the fifth stage.

The young Canadian was part of an eight-rider breakaway, in which she ultimately finished fourth after a sprint. It wasn’t what Van Dam had hoped for, she said in a press release. “I’m a little disappointed because I felt like I could have won. But all in all, I can be happy with the progress I’ve made and how I rode today.”

According to the Canadian rider, the fourth-place finish was due to a poor sprint. “It was a really tough day. The climbs came one after another, and on the descent, we were going full throttle downhill. That was pretty nerve-wracking. At one point, I ended up in a breakaway group, and the eight of us entered the final stretch together. Unfortunately, I messed up my sprint and just missed out on a podium spot.”

The seventh stage toward Mont Ventoux will revolve around overall leaders Ferrand-Prévot and Femke de Vries, and if the general classification remains tight, there’s a good chance that the final stage 9 around Nice will also be contested by the GC contenders. That leaves one more opportunity on Saturday during the eighth stage, which features plenty of climbing but ends with a flat finish in Nice itself.

“It is what it is; you try your best every day,” road captain Marianne Vos told NOS ahead of stage 6. The 39-year-old Dutch rider has come away with something tangible from almost every one of her four previous Tour appearances, whether that was the green points jersey in 2022 and 2024 or stage victories — two in 2022 and one in 2025. This time, however, she too is still on zero.

“In principle, we’re still riding for the general classification, especially now that Femke is doing well,” Vos said of her role within the team. “And with Pauline, you know that we’ll keep supporting her. Whether I’ll get involved myself? All I can say is that I’ll do my best every day,” she concluded with a laugh.